EXCHANGE 


SHAFTESBURY'S 

ETHICAL  PRINCIPLE 


OF 


A  D  APTATION    TO 
UNIVERSAL  HARMONY 

Thesis  for  Ph.   D. 


By 
ALEXANDER  LYONS,  M.A. 


ACCEPTED  BY  THE  FACULTY 
OF 

NEW  YORK  UNIVERSITY 
1909 


SHAFTESBURY'S 

ETHICAL  PRINCIPLE 


OF 


ADAPTATION    TO 
UNIVERSAL  HARMONY 

Thesis  for  Ph.  D. 


By 
ALEXANDER  LYONS,  M.A. 


.ACCEPTED  BY  THE  FACULTY 
OF 

NEW  YORK  UNIVERSITY 
1909 


To 
REV.  DR.  HENRY  BERKOWITZ,  PHILADELPHIA 

TO  WHOM  THE  AUTHOR  OWES  THE  BEGINNING  OF  HIS 

PROFESSIONAL  LIFE,  THIS   MONOGRAPH   IS   LOVINGLY 

DEDICATED  AS  A  LITTLE  TOKEN  OF  A  LARGE 

APPRECIATION 


CONTENTS 


I. — A.  INTRODUCTION.  Aim  of  thesis  expository  and  critical. 
Justification  for  such  presentation:  Absence  of  anything 
similar  for  the  use  of  the  English  student  of  ethics.  Shaftes- 
bury  considered  in  comparison  with  Hobbes.  This  not 
usually  done.  Shaftesbury  not  in  avowed  antagonism  to 
Hobbes,  but  more  concerned  to  defend  his  own  theistic 
position  and  thus  save  ethics  in  its  divorce  from  religion. 
He  professes  opposition,  to  Locke,  and  yet  must  be  con- 
trasted with  Hobbes  who  furnished  the  starting  point  of 
English  ethical  speculation.  Pages  7-10. 

B.  HOBBES*  ETHICAL  THEORY.  Ethics  a  human  invention 
necessitated  by  man's  primitive  condition  of  mutual  con- 
flict with  his  fellows.  A  state  of  such  warfare  preventive 
of  peace  and  progress.  Man  too  selfish  voluntarily  to 
reconcile  differences.  A  supreme  authority  requisite,  the 
will  of  which  in  keeping  with  a  covenant  to  be  determinative 
of  conduct.  Right,  wrong,  and  conscience  take  their  rise 
and  significance  from  this  covenant.  Hobbes'  ethical  system 
empirical,  relative,  and  thoroughly  hedonistic.  Pages  10-11. 

II.— A.  SHAFTESBURY'S  ETHICAL  TEACHING.  Contrast  to 
Hobbes  irreconcilable  and  yet  not  duly  recognized.  Shaftes- 
bury, like  Hobbes,  starts  from  human  nature.  The  man  of 
his  conception  social  by  birth  and  good  by  instinct,  good- 
ness signifying  sociality.  His  conception  of  man's  nature 
in  striking  contrast  with  orthodox  Christian  teaching.  Con- 
science: the  consciousness  of  conflict  with  natural  good- 
ness. Conscience  as  here  defined  contributory  to  the  con- 
science of  religious  teaching.  Pages  11-14. 

B.  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  THE  WHOLE.  The  whole,  Shaftes- 
bury's  starting-point.  Its  content.  Necessity  of  such  a 
starting-point.  The  whole  no  assumption;  a  logical  con- 
clusion. It  is  inescapable.  Failure  to  find  it  the  result  of 
man's  improper  attitude. 

The  whole  an  all-inclusive  relationship,  an  organism. 
Harmonious,  therefore"  good. 

The  manifold  significance  and  application  of  the  whole. 
It  gives  validity  to  the  details  of  experience  and  nature. 
Furnishes  standard  of  measurement  of  the  good.  The 
good,  that  which  is  contributory  to  the  whole.  Mere  har- 
mony insufficient. 


296266 


The  whole  through  its  impressiveness  conducive  to  good- 
ness. This  specially  evidenced  in  conscience.  Disregard  of 
the  whole  destructive  of  goodness.  The  whole  further  con- 
servative of  goodness  through  pleasure. 

Man's  conflicting  affections  reconciled  by  the  whole 
through  its  assertion  of  the  balance  of  its  harmonious  re- 
lations. 

The  whole  related  to  a  "sovereign  genius."  A  modified 
dualism. 

Significance  of  concept  of  the  whole  in  Shaftesbury's 
life.  A  dominant  passion.  An  exemplification  in  his 
patriotism. 

Shaftesbury's  fundamental  conception  not  duly  regarded 
although  of  considerable  influence.  Herder,  Thomson, 
Tennyson  his  beneficiaries.  Pope  an  extensive  borrower. 
Pages  14-25. 

C.  COMPARATIVE  VALUE  OF  SHAFTESBURY'S  TEACH- 

ING. His  superiority  to  Hobbes  and  Locke.  To  these 
morality  a  creation  human  or  divine.  To  Shaftesbury  it  is 
uncreate,  absolute,  and  obligatory  even  upon  God.  Moral- 
ity thus  uplifted,  but  God  not  lowered. 

Virtue  not  mere  mechanical  adaptation  but  conscious  and 
intentional.  Goodness  natural  adaptation,  virtue  intentional 
adaptation.  Virtue  proportionate  to  effort.  Further,  moral 
motive  requisite.  A  moral  motive,  that  which  is  of  social 
purport  and  without  personal  reference.  Shaftesbury 
Kantian  in  spirit. 

Man's  native  goodness  not  an  accomplishment  but  a 
faculty.  Goodness  the  possibility,  virtue  the  realization. 
Pages  26-28. 

D.  THE   MORAL  SENSE.     Shaftesbury's    most    characteristic 

ethical  teaching.  Morality  a  substantive  universal  harmony. 
The  moral  sense,  that  by  which  this  harmony  is  apprehended, 
just  as  artistic  beauty  is  grasped  by  the  artistic  sense. 
Explanation  of  the  moral  sense.  It  is  native  and  inde-- 
structible.  Not  full-formed  at  birth  but  educable.  Moral 
sense  determinative  of  conduct.  Pages  29-32. 

E.  SHAFTESBURY     AND     CUMBERLAND.       Shaftesbury's 

other  teachings  than  that  of  the  moral  sense  anticipated  in 
part  by  Cumberland  although  in  a  far  inferior  way.  Cum- 
berland's method  entirely  intellectual.  Conscience  in- 
tellectual. Morality  mediated  through  the  mind.  With 
Shaftesbury  through  the  feeling.  Pages  32-34. 

F.  ETHICS  AND  RELIGION.     Relation  in  Shaftesbury's  sys- 

tem. Little  direct  value  in  his  discussion  of  this  subject. 
To  be  credited  with  having  distinguished  the  separateness 
of  the  two  spheres.  Shaftesbury  not  weak  in  idea  of  God, 
but  strongly  antagonistic  to  misconceptions  of  God. 


Stephen  wrongly  claims  God  to  be  essential  to  Shaftes- 
bury's system.  God  real  to  Shaftesbury  but  unessential  to 
his  teaching.  Religion  not  source  of  ethics.  Ethics  possible 
to  atheism.  The  two  mutually  supplementary,  but  the 
method  not  indicated.  Religion  virtually  discarded.  Kant 
more  helpful.  Pages  34-36. 

G.  CLASSIFICATION  OF  SHAFTESBURY.  Hedonistic  or  in- 
tuitional? Nowhere  duly  discussed.  Cursory  reading  re- 
sults doubtfully.  Ultimate  decision  to  be  determined  by 
consideration  of  both  Shaftesbury's  opinion  and  his  spirit. 
His  formal  ethical  writings  hedonistic;  goodness  inter- 
preted in  terms  of  pleasure.  His  intuitional  teachings  more 
emphatic.  Virtue  based  upon  inherent  attractiveness.  His 
discarding  of  religion  from  the  ethical  standpoint  implies 
the  intuitional  position.  Further  exemplification  in  his  op- 
position to  virtue  as  utility.  Consideraton  of  the  spirit  of 
his  teachings  inforces  the  intuitional  view.  In  his  less 
formal  writings  this  very  palpable.  Further,  while  appeal 
of  virtue  is  commonly  put  on  its  own  basis  without  other 
reference  to  pleasure  than  as  a  result,  virtue  is  rarely  in- 
culcated for  the  sake  of  pleasure.  Pleasure,  when  urged, 
is  for  the  sake  of  virtue,  and  not  the  reverse.  And  yet  his 
intuitionalism  not  cogent.  Theoretically  valid,  practically 
it  fails  to  hold.  Earlier  part  of  his  writings  intuitional, 
later  hedonistic.  Shaftesbury  realized  the  practical  weak- 
ness of  the  intuitional  position.  Butler's  confession  of  the 
weakness  of  conscience  anticipated.  Shaftesbury  intuitional 
in  intention,  hedonistic  in  realization.  Pages  36-39. 

III.  DISCUSSION.  Shaftesbury's  merit  great  and  manifold. 
First  in  English  thought  to  protest  against  a  manufactured 
morality.  He  gave  impulse  to  the  popularization  of  the 
view  of  morality  as  sub  specie  eterni. 

Some  of  the  general  convictions  of  present  sociological 
teaching  anticipated.  Confirmation  from  Giddings  and 
Spencer.  Further  anticipation  and  broader  application  of 
the  insistence  of  evolutionary  ethics. 

Shaftesbury's  most  characteristic  doctrine,  the  moral 
sense,  subject  to  detraction.  Misunderstood  by  Stephen. 
Its  proper  interpretation.  And  yet  no  novelty  but  a 
philosophic  expression  of  a  familiar  fact:  Moral  sense 
an  expression  of  the  feelings,  striking  but  psychologically 
incorrect.  The  teaching,  however,  valuable.  It  emphasizes 
that  morality  is  ultimately  determined  by  feeling.  Failure 
to  indicate  method  of  education  of  the  moral  sense  a  defect. 

Detraction  of  Shaftesbury's  originality.  Windelband  not 
to  the  point.  Fowler  more  correct.  Shaftesbury  com- 
pacted of  Plato  and  Aristotle,  especially  Plato.  Chiefly  a 
reproduction  of  Stoicism.  His  only  admissible  originality 
the  moral  sense,  though  this  not  beyond  qualification. 


Shaftesbury  repeats  the  Socratic  mistake  of  the  identifica- 
tion of  knowledge  and  virtue.  He  errs  further  in  excessive 
generalization  of  man's  goodness.  His  submission  to  the 
world-order  the  summation  of  religion.  Absence  of  criter- 
ion by  which  to  determine  harmonization  with  the  whole  a 
defect  in  his  teaching. 

Shaftesbury  still  great  as  moral  teacher.  Emphasized  the 
importance  of  the  relation  of  ethics  to  a  world-order.  The 
Characteristics  inadequately  praised.  Destined  to  greater 
esteem.  Shaftesbury  an  exceptional  man.  His  teachings 
express  himself.  These  will  call  attention  to  him  only  to 
be  further  inforced  by  him.  Pages  40-47. 
BIBLIOGRAPHY.  Page  48. 


INTRODUCTION 


A.  The  aim  of  this  thesis  will  be  expository  and  critical. 
Its  justification  lies  in  the  fact  that  there  is  need  in  English  of 
a  succinct,  clear  statement  of  Shaftesbury's  ethical  teaching 
from  a  comparative  critical  standpoint.  This  is  especially 
true  with  reference  to  students  of  ethics  to  whom  other  lan- 
guages than  the  English  are  not  familiar.  Besides,  there  is 
not  at  present  in  any  language  a  presentation  of  the  subject 
after  the  manner  to  be  pursued  here. 

An  appreciation  of  Shaftesbury  must  be  determined  by  a 
comparison  of  his  ethical  teaching  with  that  of  Hobbes.  This 
is  not  the  usual  course.  As  a  rule  presentations  and  discus- 
sions of  our  author  take  him  in  and  by  himself  with  only 
incidental  reference  to  Hobbes.  This  manner  of  treatment 
is  acceptable  if  our  aim  is  the  expression  of  a  judgment  from 
our  standpoint.  And  yet  even  this  is  open  to  serious  objec- 
tion. It  is  unfair  to  judge  a  writer  of  the  beginning  of  the 
eighteenth  century  by  the  more  advanced  standard  and  cul- 
ture of  the  commencement  of  the  twentieth  century.  We 
must  estimate  an  author  in  his  historical  setting,  and  more 
particularly  with  reference  to  some  standard  of  his  time. 
Such  a  criterion  in  ethical  teaching  in  Shaftesbury's  day  was 
furnished  by  Hobbes  from  whom  subsequent  English  ethical 
speculation  took  its  rise. 

Shaftesbury's  ethical  system  is  diametrically  opposed  to 
that  of  Hobbes,  but  does  not  profess  any  such  intention.  We 
have  no  reason  to  believe  that  he  intended  a  refutation  of 
Hobbes.  He  refers  to  him  several  times  by  implication  as 
when  in  his  discussion,  "Concerning  Virtue  or  Merit" 
(I.  281),  he  mentions  "a  known  way  of  reasoning  on  self- 
interest,"  according  to  which  that  which  is  of  a  social  kind 
in  us  should  of  right  be  abolished.  Here,  as  Robertson,  the 
editor  of  the  Characteristics  (Ibid.),  points  out,  Hobbes  is 
in  the  mind  of  our  author.  A  plainer  reference  to  him  may 
be  found  in  the  "Essay  on  the  Freedom  of  Wit  and  Humor" 


(Ibid.,  I.,  56),  where  he  says  that  "some  of  our  most  ad- 
mired modern  philosophers  had  told  us,  that  virtue  and  vice 
had,  after  all,  no  other  law  or  measure  than  mere  fashion 
and  vogue."  Further  allusion  is  made  to  Hobbes'  funda- 
mental doctrine  of  human  selfishness  (Ibid.,  I.,  61,  63,  64), 
where  Shaftesbury  presents  a  different  conclusion  from 
Hobbes  with  regard  to  the  proper  recourse  for  man's  safety 
from  individual  selfishness,  but  nowhere  is  Hobbes  directly 
mentioned  by  way  of  discussion.  This  is  remarkable.  In 
his  "Letters  to  a  Young  Man,"  as  will  be  noticed  later, 
Shaftesbury  warns  against  Locke.  He  regards  Hobbes' 
philosophy  as  relieved  of  its  poison  by  its  author's  character 
and  base  slavish  principles  of  government,  and  so  not  needing 
particular  attention.  In  this  Shaftesbury  may  be  said  to  have 
erred.  In  general  an  author's  character  does  not  discredit 
his  philosophy.  If  Locke  appeared  to  Shaftesbury  to  call 
for  special  mention,  Hobbes  certainly  demanded  it  the  more. 
This  omission  may,  however,  be  due  to  the  fact  that  the 
spirit  and  method  of  Shaftesbury's  presentation  are  not  con- 
troversial. The  impetus  to  a  statement  and  clarification  of 
his  opinions  was  no  doubt  determined  in  part  by  the  teaching 
of  Hobbes,  as  Fowler  (Shaftesbury,  100)  suggests.  Hobbes 
had  set  the  pace  in  the  direction  of  naturalistic  ethics  and  was 
for  many  subsequent  ethical  thinkers  the  subject  of  diverse 
discussion.  But  Shaftesbury  appears  more  concerned  to 
present  his  own  opinions  than  to  controvert  those  of  someone 
else.  Indeed,  there  is  ground  to  hold  that  he  had  in  mind  not 
a  refutation  of  Hobbes,  but  a  clarification  and  vindication  of 
his  deistic  position  with  reference  to  ethics.  If  ethical  teach- 
ing was  not  as  had  been  generally  believed  and  as  Locke 
maintained,  an  expression  of  "the  will  and  law  of  God" 
(Essay  Bk.,  I.,  Ch.  3,  Sec.  6),  what  anchorage  remained  to 
it  to  give  it  stability  and  credibility?  Shaftesbury  himself 
leaves  no  doubt  that  he  was  concerned  to  save  ethics  in  the 
divorce  of  ethics  and  religion  in  a  deistic  system.  An  over- 
whelmingly larger  part  of  his  "Inquiry  concerning  Virtue  or 
Merit"  is  devoted  to  a  presentation  of  the  independent  appeal 
of  ethics.  To  the  consistent  theist  this  would  be  gratuitous. 
Besides,  the  very  introductory  section  of  his  "Inquiry"  in- 
dicates the  purport  of  the  work  to  be  to  show  that  while  re- 
ligion and  virtue  are  commonly  held  to  be  inseparable  com- 
panions they  are  not  so  but  that  "each  has  its  proper  province 

8 


and  due  rank"  (Char.,  I.,  239).  And  in  pursuance  of  this 
purpose  Shaftesbury  shows  that  while  religion  has  an  in- 
cidental ethical  value  as  accompaniment  of  virtue,  virtue 
wields  an  attractive  power  through  an  inherent  charm. 
Shaftesbury  might,  accordingly,  be  more  properly  regarded 
as  in  antagonism  with  his  teacher  Locke  who  inculcated  that 
morality,  though  empirically  determined,  is  at  its  source  an 
assertion  of  a  divine  will  which  has  "by  an  inseparable  con- 
nection joined  virtue  and  public  happiness  together,"  and  is 
on  this  account  incumbent  upon  man.  This  view  of  Locke 
may  at  first  glance  appear  striking  as  incongruous  with  his 
general  empirical  position,  but  it  is  urged  here  as  representa- 
tive of  the  tendency  of  his  ethical  theory  had  it  been  worked 
out.  Rogers  (Student's  History,  357)  maybe  appropriately 
cited  here  when  he  says  that  according  to  Locke  uthe  true 
ground  of  morality  is  the  will  and  law  of  a  God"  "who  sees 
men  in  the  dark,  has  in  his  hands  rewards  and  punishments, 
and  power  enough  to  call  to  account  the  proudest  offender." 
The  view  here  given  of  Locke's  ethical  tendency  finds  further 
support  in  the  article  on  Shaftesbury,  Encyl.  Britan.,  Vol. 
XXL,  and  in  Sidgwick's  Outlines  (p.  176),  where  we  are 
told  that  Locke  regarded  the  aggregate  of  ethical  rules  as 
the  law  of  God.  Locke  himself  leaves  no  doubt  as  to  his 
position  in  this  matter  wrhen,  in  speaking  of  the  proof  of  a 
deity  (Essay,  II.,  Bk.  IV.,  Sec.  7),  he  denominates  it  a 
fundamental  truth  of  such  consequence  that  all  religion  and 
genuine  morality  depend  upon  it.  Though  this  view  of 
Locke's  warranted  Shaftesbury's  opposition  to  him,  yet  in 
his  formal  public  writings  he  does  not  mention  Locke  by 
name  for  the  reason,  as  Gizycki  (p.  76)  appropriately  sug- 
gests, that  the  reverence  of  a  pupil  for  his  teacher  forbade. 
Locke  superintended  his  entire  early  education.  To  him,  as 
he  confessed,  next  to  his  immediate  parents,  he  owed  the 
greatest  obligation  (Hodder  I.,  24).  But  in  his  "Letters  to 
a  Young  Man"  (p.  41),  written  after  Locke's  death,  which 
were  not  for  public  knowledge,  he  freely  censured  Locke's 
theory  of  ethics,  declaring  it  to  be  "very  poor  philosophy." 
Even  mentioning  Locke  by  name  he  says:  "Locke  struck  the 
home  blow.  Hobbes'  character  and  base  slavish  principles 
of  government  took  off  the  poison  of  his  philosophy.  'Twas 
Mr.  Locke  that  struck  at  all  fundamentals,  threw  all  order 
and  virtue  out  of  the  world,  and  made  the  very  ideas  of 


these  unnatural  and  without  foundation  in  our  minds"  (Ibid., 
39) .  "Virtue,  according  to  Mr.  Locke,  has  no  other  measure, 
law,  or  rule,  than  fashion  and  custom;  morality,  justice, 
equity  depend  only  on  law  and  will.  This  is  very  poor 
philosophy."  (Ibid.,  40,  41.)  And  yet  Shaftesbury's  im- 
portance as  an  ethical  teacher  lies  not  in  his  opposition  to 
Locke  but  in  his  contrast  to  Hobbes,  in  the  high  level  he  gave 
to  ethics  in  contradistinction  to  him,  and  in  the  comparative 
novelty  of  his  inculcation  of  an  ethical  sense.  Hence,  to  ap- 
preciate Shaftesbury  we  must  start  with  a  presentation  of  the 
ethical  teaching  of  Hobbes. 


HOBBES'   ETHICAL  THEORY 

B.  To  Hobbes  ethics  is  a  human  invention  pure  and 
simple,  an  expedient  upon  the  road  of  human  progress  from 
savagery  to  civilization.  It  is  an  outcome  of  man's  primitive 
nature  and  condition.  In  their  primal  natural  state,  accord- 
ing to  Hobbes  (Leviathan,  pp.  81,  et  sq.),  men  are  so 
equal  in  their  faculties  of  body  and  mind  that  one  cannot 
claim  to  himself  any  benefit  to  which  another  may  not  pre- 
tend as  well  as  he.  This  equality  of  ability  gives  rise  to 
equality  of  hope  in  attaining  the  ends  suggested  by  desire. 
But  when  two  desire  the  same  thing  which  they  can't  both 
enjoy,  they  become  enemies,  and  on  the  way  to  the  assertion 
of  their  respective  desires  they  wage  war  upon  one  another. 
This  condition  on  a  small  scale  in  the  relation  of  individuals 
to  each  other  is  repeated  in  the  large  in  society  generally.  In 
this  state  of  virtual  warfare  of  all  against  all  there  is  no  place 
for  industry,  culture  of  earth,  navigation,  or  society,  but 
continual  danger  of  violent  death,  and  consequent  fear.  But 
man  desires  peace,  its  opportunities  and  pleasures.  He  is, 
however,  too  selfish,  according  to  Hobbes,  to  compose  his 
differences  with  his  fellows  by  concessions  and  mutual  adapta- 
tions, so  by  general  surrender  a  supreme  power  and  authority 
is  instituted  to  which  all  become  subject  in  keeping  with  an  ac- 
cepted covenant.  This  covenant  furnishes  the  norm  of  jus- 
tice and  the  starting  point  of  ethics.  "Justice  is  the  keeping 
of  valid  covenants,  injustice  is  non-performance  of  them." 
(Leviathan,  pp.  97,  98.)  Prior  to  covenant  there  is  no 

10 


ethical  distinction.  Individual  desire  determines  good  and 
evil.  There  is  consistently  no  such  thing  as  conscience  in  our 
acceptation  of  the  term  in  the  individual  of  Hobbes'  concep- 
tion. Nor  does  it  enter  in  our  sense  even  after  the  institution 
of  a  covenant.  For  Hobbes  conscience  naturally  carries  no 
moral  reference.  It  is  simply  as  its  literal  signification  im- 
plies, a  knowing  together  shared  by  several  instead  of  being 
confined  to  the  individual  subjectively.  Violation  of  con- 
science to  Hobbes  is  merely  contravention  by  one  of  knowl- 
edge of  anything  shared  by  several.  (Leviathan,  39-40.)  It 
has  an  intellectual  connotation  and  is  in  no  sense  of  moral 
worth.  Where  men  are  out  of  relation  with  each  other  there 
is  no  place  for  conscience.  The  absence  of  a  moral  element 
from  Hobbes'  conception  of  conscience  is  characteristic  of 
his  entire  ethical  system.  To  possess  worth  and  appeal 
morality  must  be  more  than  mere  human  convention  and 
custom.  Its  majesty  lies  either  in  its  superhuman  or  super- 
material  origin.  With  Hobbes  it  is  neither  of  these.  Its 
origin  is  entirely  empirical.  "Man  has  from  birth  nothing 
but  sense"  (Leviathan,  41),  and  from  this  all  subsequent  ex- 
pressions of  his  life,  even  the  so-called  moral,  are  formed, 
although  from  the  unmoral  the  moral  cannot  be  derived. 

The  relativity  of  Hobbes'  ethical  principle  is  further  man- 
ifest in  its  dependence  upon  pleasure.  Man  does  the  right  or 
the  just  because  it  conduces  to  his  peace  and  pleasure.  The 
pleasant  is  the  good,  the  unpleasant  the  evil.  In  such  a  sys- 
tem the  painfulness  of  righteous  self-surrender  such  as  con- 
stitutes the  grandeur  and  glory  of  martyrdom  is  wholly  un- 
thinkable. It  is  a  thorough-going  hedonism  carried  to  a 
logical  extreme  which  may  be  called  moral  only  by  an  elastic 
usage  of  the  term,  but  would  be  more  correctly  characterized 
as  private  speculation  in  the  interest  of  personal  pleasure. 


SHAFTESBURY'S    ETHICAL    TEACHING 

II 

A.  The  step  from  the  ethical  teaching  of  Hobbes  to  that 
of  Shaftesbury  is  comparable  to  a  sudden  rise  from  the  depths 
to  the  heights.  There  we  experience  a  sense  of  depression, 
here  one  of  elevation  into  a  lofty,  purer  atmosphere.  The 


1 1 


contrast  furnished  by  Shaftesbury's  teaching  has  not  been 
sufficiently  distinguished  and  emphasized  by  anyone. 

An  exposition  of  Shaftesbury's  ethical  teaching  must  start 
as  with  Hobbes  from  a  presentation  of  the  nature  of  man. 
In  each  case  the  human  material  determines  the  ethical  con- 
ception. Both  had  the  significant  insight  that  man  and  not 
God,  as  Locke  maintained,  is  the  starting  point  of  ethical 
theory,  although  Shaftesbury  transcended  both  in  his  in- 
sistence that  morality  is  no  manufacture  either  of  human  or 
divine  effectuation.  It  is  rather  an  entity  or  relationship  in- 
herent in  the  nature  of  things,  that  needed  only  to  be  de- 
tected. Not  having  been  manufactured  either  divinely  or 
humanly,  as  with  Locke  and  Hobbes,  it  is  presumably  co- 
extensive with  the  rest  of  existence  from  which  it  is  insepar- 
able. 

Both  Hobbes  and  Shaftesbury  proceed  deductively  from 
an  assumption  with  regard  to  man's  constitution,  but  from 
antipodal  conceptions.  To  Hobbes,  as  we  have  seen,  man  is 
an  exemplification  of  selfishness,  the  superstructure  of  his 
entire  life  being  founded  upon  an  unmitigated  egoism. 
Shaftesbury  starts  from  a  more  optimistic  complimentary 
view  of  human  nature.  To  him  man  is  not  only  not  selfish, 
but  social.  Indeed,  to  be  unsocial  is  to  be  abnormal.  "A 
mind  -that  refuses  its  consent  to  what  is  acted  in  the  whole 
and  for  the  good  of  the  whole  is  the  same  as  a  hand  that 
should  refuse  to  act  for  the  body."  (Regimen,  p.  n.) 
Sociality  is  an  ear-mark  of  man  in  his  human  distinction.  uTo 
be  a  man  means  to  be  a  citizen  of  the  world  and  to  prefer 
the  interest  of  the  world."  (Ibid.,  u.)  "A  human  infant 
is  of  all  the  most  helpless,  weak,  senseless,  and  longest  con- 
tinues so.  Does  not  this  refer  man  to  society  and  force  him 
to  own  that  he  is  purposely,  and  not  by  accident,  made  rational 
and  sociable,  and  cannot  otherwise  increase  or  subsist  but  in 
and  by  society?"  (Regimen,  p.  188.)  Man  accordingly  is 
made  for  society,  in  it  he  attains  his  highest  possibility,  and 
apart  from  it  would  degenerate.  The  only  perfection,  the 
only  tolerable  state  of  man,  and  that  alone  in  which  he  can 
possibly  endure  or  subsist  is  society.  (Ibid.,  52.)  It  is 
therefore  an  evidence  of  wisdom  for  a  man  to  adapt  himself 
to  society.  He  is  thus  acting  normally. 

Not  only  is  man  social  by  nature,  but  good  as  well.  In- 
deed, sociality  which,  according  to  Shaftesbury  signifies  har- 


12 


monious  relationship  and  adaptation  of  man  to  his  environ- 
ment,  implies  a  nature  that    is    good.       Shaftesbury    very 
logically  and  philosophically  denies  an  unmoral  origin  to  the 
moral  as  is  affirmed  in  the  system  of  Hobbes.      He    very 
wisely  says:     "Faith,  justice,  honesty,  and  virtue,  must  have 
been  as  early  as  the  state  of  nature  or  they  could  never  have 
been  at  all."     (Characteristics,  I.,  p.  73.)     "Civil  union,  or 
confederacy,  could  never  make  right  or  wrong  if  they  sub- 
sisted not  before."      (Ibid.)      "Worth  and  merit  are  sub- 
stantial, and  no  way  variable  by  fancy  or  will."     (Ibid.,  83.) 
Man  brings  goodness  with  him  and  finds  goodness  in  the 
universe  when  he  comes.     "As  it  seems  hard  to  pronounce 
any  man  an  absolute  atheist,  so  is  it  to  pronounce  one  abso- 
lutely corrupt  or  vicious,  there  being  few  even  of  the  hardest 
villains  wrho  have  not  something  of  virtue."      (Characteris- 
tics, I.,  p.  257.)     "There  scarcely  is  or  can  be  any  creature 
whom  consciousness  of  villainy  as  such  merely  does  not  at 
all  offend  nor  anything  opprobrious  or  heinously  imputable 
move  or  affect."     (Ibid.,  I.,  p.  306.)     In  fact,  Shaftesbury 
maintains  that  absence  of  response  to  the  good  from  the  very 
moment  when  man  is  affected  by  sensible  stimuli  tokens  an 
ill  and  unnatural  constitution.     Not  only  so,  but  so  normal  is 
man's  native  goodness  that  he  does  not  lose  it  except  through 
the  application  to  him  of  some  art    or    strong    endeavor. 
(Ibid.,   259,   260.)      Shaftesbury  is  very  emphatic  on  this 
point.    His  teaching  of  man's  native  goodness  is  so  clear  and 
conspicuous  that  it  is  noteworthy  that  its  conflict  with  ortho- 
dox Christian  teaching  of  his  time,  and  even  of  our's,  has 
never  been  adverted  to.     While  his  deism  was  strenuously 
fought  by  contemporaries   as   inimical  to   Christianity,   his 
anthropological  teaching  wras  more  fundamentally  subversive 
as  undermining  the  very  foundation  of  the  Christian  plan  of 
salvation  as  laid  down  by  Paul.     In  presentations  and  dis- 
cussions of  Shaftesbury  his  conception  of  goodness  as  pro- 
portion has  commonly  been  exalted  into  a  position  of  pre- 
eminence.    There  is,  however,  justification  for  maintaining 
that  historically,  both  for  theology  and  ethics,  the  implica- 
tion of  Shaftesbury's  doctrine  in  its  reference  to  the  pessimis- 
tic conception  of  human  nature  as  taught  by  orthodox  Chris- 
tianity and  by  Hobbes  should  receive  more  prominence  and 
consideration. 

It  is  the  naturalness  and  instinctiveness  of  goodness  to  a 

13 


human  being  that  gives  rise  to  Shaftesbury's  conception  of 
conscience.  The  difficulty  that  is  generally  found  in  an  at- 
tempt to  explain  conscience  does  not  exist  for  him.  To  him 
it  is  logically  consistent  with  his  fundamental  teaching  of 
human  nature.  Goodness  is  harmony,  naturalness,  and  peace 
or  ease.  Badness  is  disharmony,  unnaturalness,  and  discom- 
fort or  pain.  Accordingly,  he  says :  Two  things  are  horridly 
offensive  and  grievous  to  a  rational  creature,  viz. :  to  have 
mental  reflection  of  any  unjust  act  which  he  knows  to  be 
naturally  odious  and  ill-deserving,  or  of  any  foolish  action 
which  he  knows  to  be  prejudicial  to  his  own  interest  or  happi- 
ness. The  former  of  these  is  conscience.  Conscience,  there- 
fore, is  not  representative,  as  is  commonly  believed,  of  man's 
sense  of  responsibility  to  and  fear  of  the  Deity.  In  Shaftes- 
bury's sense  conscience  is  antecedent  and  contributory  to  the 
conscience  of  religion.  How  conscience  in  Shaftesbury's 
sense  leads  to  conscience  in  the  religious  sense  is  ingeniously 
explained  by  him  thus :  "What  men  know  they  deserve  from 
every  one  they  necessarily  fear  and  expect  from  all.  Thus 
suspicions  and  ill  apprehensions  must  arise  with  terror,  both 
of  men  and  of  the  Deity."  (Char.,  I.,  306.)  But  conscience 
in  Shaftesbury's  sense  may  exist  apart  from  religion,  although 
the  religious  conscience  cannot  exist  apart  from  it.  It  is 
simply  man's  painful  sense  of  disharmony  and  disruption 
from  that  which  is  natural. 

Shaftesbury's  conviction  of  the  social  and  moral  nature 
of  man  consists  with  his  conception  of  things  universally.  To 
understand  him  best  it  is  necessary  to  view  his  teachings  in 
relation  to  a  conception  of  a  whole  which  is  fundamental  with 
him  and  to  which  with  varied  application  and  in  various 
forms  he  refers  again  and  again. 


THE    DOCTRINE   OF   THE   WHOLE 

B.  This  whole  is  Shaftesbury's  starting  point.  It  com- 
prises all  that  is  outside  of  or  objective  to  the  Deity.  It  is 
an  entire  thing  of  which  all  hangs  together  as  of  a  piece. 
(Characteristics,  II.,  99.)  It  is  what  he  understood  by  the 
universe. 

The  necessity  of  such  a  starting  point  Shaftesbury  prop- 


erly  indicates  in  the  need  of  some  standard  of  measurement 
in  a  world  where  all  is  so  plainly  relative.  An  artist,  he  tells 
us  (Ibid.,  I.,  214),  must  have  an  idea  of  perfection  to  which 
to  refer  for  guidance  or  his  performance  will  be  found  to  be 
defective  and  mean.  Although  his  ambition  is  to  please  the 
world  he  must  in  his  references  be  above  it.  He  must  hold 
his  mental  eye  fixed  upon  that  beauty  of  nature  as  a  whole 
which  mankind  in  their  limited  or  unrefined  vision  call  unin- 
telligible. The  artist  in  this  conception  is  presented,  as  he 
really  is,  as  the  mediator  and  interpreter  between  the  whole 
and  its  constituent  parts.  That  Shaftesbury  himself  as  moral 
teacher  was  guided  by  such  thought  of  a  higher  reference 
appears  in  his  assertion  with  regard  to  such  teachers.  He 
says  (Ibid.,  I.,  216)  that  there  can  be  no  kind  of  writing 
which  relates  to  men  and  manners  where  it  is  not  necessary 
for  the  author  to  understand  poetical  and  moral  truth,  the 
beauty  of  sentiments,  the  sublime  of  characters,  and  carry 
in  his  eye  the  model  or  exemplar  of  that  natural  grace  which 
gives  to  every  action  its  attractive  charm.  This  model  or 
exemplar  of  natural  grace  is  Shaftesbury's  standard,  ex- 
pressed or  implied,  to  which  he  makes  persistent  reference. 
It  is  something,  he  tells  us,  to  which  we  must  look  up  or 
back,  something  to  be  regarded  in  the  light  of  a  higher  coun- 
try to  which  our  allegiance  must  be  paid. 

This  whole  in  Shaftesbury's  teaching  is  no  gratuitous  as- 
sumption. In  the  nature  of  the  case  it  cannot  be  demon- 
strated. It  is  a  logical  conclusion  based  upon  the  necessary 
assumption  of  a  rational  universe.  We  find  relation  in  that 
part  of  the  universe  with  which  we  are  familiar.  As  to  the 
part  which  lies  beyond  our  present  knowledge,  we  may 
properly  have  recourse  to  the  reasonable  claim  that  "if  in  the 
infinite  residue,  there  were  no  principle  of  union,  it  would 
seem  next  to  impossible  that  things  within  our  sphere  should 
be  consistent  and  keep  in  order.  What  was  infinite  would  be 
predominant."  (Characteristics,  II.,  108.) 

Having  thus  vindicated  the  existence  of  order  or  relation 
in  the  realm  beyond  our  present  perception  and  knowledge, 
Shaftesbury  holds  this  order  to  indicate  logically  the  existence 
of  a  perfect  whole  necessitated  by  the  aggregation  of  parts 
which  are  orderly.  To  his  mind  detection  of  the  whole  is 
consequent  upon  a  knowledge  of  a  part  thereof.  We  have 
an  echo  of  this  doctrine  in  Tennyson's  familiar  lines, 

15 


"Flower  in  the  crannied  wall, 
I  pluck  you  out  of  the  crannies ; 
Hold  you  here,  root  and  all,  in  my  hand, 
Little  flower — but  if  I  could  understand 
What  you  are,  root  and  all,  and  all  in  all, 
I  should  know  what  God  and  man  is." 

Shaftesbury,  however,  went  farther  than  Tennyson  in 
that  he  believed  himself  to  be  possessed  of  a  sufficient  knowl- 
edge of  the  part  to  justify  him,  through  its  universal  relation, 
to  infer  a  knowledge  of  the  whole.  He  is  so  convinced  of 
his  possession  of  such  knowledge  that  in  uThe  Moralists"  he 
expresses  surprise  at  Philocles,  who  has  such  insight  and  ac- 
curate judgment  in  the  particulars  of  natural  beings  and 
operations  that  he  is  no  better  judge  than  he  is  of  the  structure 
of  things  in  general.  Who  better  than  yourself,  says  Theocles 
(Char.,  II.,  61),  who  is  representative  of  Shaftesbury,  can 
show  the  structure  of  each  plant  and  animal  body,  declare  the 
office  of  every  part  and  organ,  and  tell  the  uses,  ends,  and 
advantages  to  which  they  serve?  How,  therefore,  should  you 
prove  so  ill  a  naturalist  in  this  whole,  and  understand  so 
little  the  anatomy  of  the  world  and  nature,  as  not  to  discern 
this  same  relation  of  parts,  the  same  consistency  and  uni- 
formity in  the  universe ! 

His  conception  of  the  reality  of  the  whole  Shaftesbury 
emphasizes  by  pointing  out  that  it  is  inescapable.  It  is  the 
implied  background  of  our  entire  lives  and  determines  us 
variously  whether  we  know  it  or  are  unconscious  of  it.  We 
are  deeply  indebted  to  it.  It  matters  not  how  depraved  our 
humors  or  taste,  we  cannot  resist  a  natural  anticipation  in 
behalf  of  nature  or  the  whole,  according  to  whose  supposed 
standard  we  perpetually  approve  or  disapprove,  and  to  which 
in  all  natural  appearances,  all  moral  actions,  we  inevitably 
appeal  and  pay  a  constant  homage.  It  is  the  basis  of  life's 
enthusiasms  and  finer  aspects.  It  is  fundamental  to  the 
beauty  of  poetry  and  the  arts.  In  confirmation  of  this  claim 
he  cites  Lucretius  as  example,  who  is  averse  to  a  universal 
background  and  traces  all  from  a  human  standpoint,  but  fails 
to  get  away  from  the  universal.  He  unconsciously  reflects 
it  in  his  admiration  and  rapturous  views  of  nature.  The 
lover,  the  ambitious,  the  warrior,  the  virtuoso  would  lose 
much  of  their  enjoyments  if  in  the  beauties  which  they  admire 

16 


and  passionately  pursue  there  were  no  reference  or  regard 
to  any  higher  majesty  or  grandeur  than  what  simply  results 
from  the  particular  objects  of  their  pursuit.  This  conceit  of 
a  universal  background  furnishes  the  seasoning  to  most  of  our 
pleasures  in  life  (Char.,  II.,  175).  The  inescapableness  of 
the  whole  constituting  nature  Shaftesbury  puts  pointedly  in 
his  translation  of  the  words  of  Horace :  "You  may  turn  out 
nature  with  a  pitchfork,  yet  back  she  will  keep  coming" 
(Char.,  II.,  289). 

Now,  although  the  whole  as  standard  of  appeal  and 
background  of  life's  reference  is  unavoidable,  there  are 
many  who  fail  to  find  it.  This  results  from  a  reversal  of  the 
proper  order  that  should  obtain  in  the  statement  of  our  rela- 
tion to  the  universe.  We  begin  with  ourselves  and  relate 
all  to  us  instead  of  oppositely  relating  ourselves  to  the  all. 
We  subject  the  interest  of  the  whole  to  the  good  and  interest 
of  the  part.  Pope,  echoing  Shaftesbury,  phrased  this- well 
when  he  said  (Essay  on  Man,  Epistle,  I.)  that  when  human 
pride  questions  the  phenomena  of  creation  it  concludes  that 
all  is  for  its  sake,  and  exclaims : 

uFor  me  kind  nature  wakes  her  genial  power, 
Suckles  each  herb,  and  spreads  out  every  flower; 
Annual  for  me,  the  grape,  the  rose,  renew 
The  juice  nectareous,  and  the  balmy  dew; 
For  me>  the  mine  a  thousand  treasures  brings ; 
For  me,  health  gushes  from  a  thousand  springs ; 
Seas  roll  to  waft  me,  suns  to  light  me  rise ; 
My  footstool  earth,  my  canopy  the  skies." 

This  attitude  Shaftesbury  opposes.  It  enlarges  the  partic- 
ular at  the  cost  of  the  obscuration  of  the  general,  forgetting 
or  not  knowing  that  the  individual  only  receives  worth  and 
significance  from  the  general  or  whole. 

This  whole  with  which  Shaftesbury  starts  is  an  all-in- 
clusive relationship.  Each  particular  is  in  relation  with  all 
in  general  and  the  latter  is  in  relation  with  each  particular. 
The  whole  is  in  other  words  an  organism.  No  single  entity, 
however  complete  a  system  of  parts  it  presents  with  refer- 
ence to  all  within,  can  be  allowed  in  the  same  manner  com- 
plete as  to  all  without,  but  must  be  considered  as  having  a 

17 


further  relation  abroad  to  the  system  of  its  kind.  This  sys- 
tem of  its  kind  has  relation  to  a  higher,  this  to  the  world, 
and  this  to  the  universe.  So  "all  things  are  united"  (Char., 
II.,  64) )  and  accordingly  organic. 

To  Shaftesbury  the  harmonious  is  the  good.  Since,  ac- 
cording to  him,  the  whole  is  harmonious,  it  is  good.  This 
he  further  clinches  by  the  argument  that  every  particular 
nature  produces  what  is  good  to  itself  unless  something  for- 
eign prevents  or  disturbs.  If  now  every  particular  nature  be 
thus  constantly  and  unerringly  true  to  itself  to  produce  what 
is  only  good  for  itself  and  conducing  to  its  own  right  state, 
shall  not  the  general  nature  or  the  whole  do  full  as  much 
since  there  is  nothing  foreign  to  it  to  do  it  violence  or  force 
it  out  of  its  natural  way?  Hence,  the  whole  is  good. 

Having  settled  upon  the  idea  of  a  whole  as  fundamental 
to  his  system,  Shaftesbury  finds  in  it  a  manifold  significance 
and  application.  It  alone  gives  validity  and  coherence  to  the 
particulars  of  human  experience.  Borne  steadily  in  mind  it 
explains  all  seeming  incongruities  and  removes  all  forbidding 
features  and  deformities,  whether  of  nature  or  mankind, 
causing  them  to  vanish  forthwith.  Lack  of  this  view  tends 
to  rob  things  of  a  genuine  enduring  worth  and  to  suppress 
the  admiration  of  natural  beauties.  If  the  universe  as  a 
whole  is  regarded  as  a  pattern  of  disorder  it  is  not  likely 
to  be  believed  to  afford  in  its  particulars  anything  lovable  or 
admirable.  From  the  vantage-point  of  Shaftesbury's  con- 
ception of  a  whole  the  world  and  its  details  are  illumined 
with  a  glow  of  poetic  beauty. 

The  application  and  influence  of  this  idea  is,  however,  not 
only  physical,  it  has  a  moral  value  as  well.  The  whole  as  a 
harmonious  relation  furnishes  a  standard  by  which  the  good 
may  be  determined.  Only  that  is  good  which  conduces  to 
the  maintenance  of  the  whole  of  which  it  is  a  part.  Whatever 
occasions  the  closer  union  of  the  individual  with  the  generality 
conduces  to  the  greater  goodness  of  that  individual.  What- 
ever bears  hurtfully  upon  the  whole  is  vicious.  Indeed,  ac- 
cording to  Shaftesbury,  good  in  the  particular  presupposes 
good  in  the  general,  of  which  it  is  only  an  expression  or 
phenomenon  just  as  the  tree  springing  from  the  earth  pre- 
supposes the  nurturing  soil.  While  it  is  commonly  held  that 
particular  virtues  like  charity  begin  at  home,  Shaftesbury 
holds  the  interesting  opposite  view  that  particular  attach- 

18 


ments  imply  a  precedent  general  attachment.  "To  be  a 
friend  to  anyone  in  particular  it  is  necessary  to  be  first  a 
friend  to  mankind"  (Char.,  I.,  40).  This  was  no  less  strik- 
ing in  his  time  than  it  appears  to  us.  After  the  manner  of 
Plato,  his  master,  Shaftesbury  recognizes  such  objection  and 
meets  it.  In  "The  Moralists"  (Char.,  II.,  41),  Philocles 
objects  that  it  is  difficult  to  qualify  for  such  friendship. 
To  this  Shaftesbury,  in  the  character  of  Theocles,  re- 
plies that  "to  be  justly  styled  the  friend  of  mankind 
requires  no  more  than  to,  be  good  and  virtuous."  His 
meaning,  more  plainly  stated,  is  that  to  be  a  friend  in  par- 
ticular or  in  the  concrete  one  must  first  have  the  quality  or 
be  characterized  by  friendship  in  the  abstract.  To  be  good 
or  virtuous  one  must  have  goodness  or  virtue.  These  things 
in  the  abstract  are  simply  statements  of  one's  sense  of  con- 
formity with  the  whole.  This  conformity  or  love,  which  is 
the  prerequisite  of  particular  love,  friendship,  goodness  or 
virtue,  is  to  Shaftesbury's  conviction  the  height  of  goodness, 
and  constitutive  of  the  temper  that  is  called  divine.  That 
relation  to  the  whole  is  the  standard  of  goodness  in  Shaftes- 
bury's teaching  and  not  mere  harmony  of  relations  has  not 
been  recognized.  Hettner,  f.i.  (Gesch.  der  Englischen  Lit., 
1 80)  says  with  reference  to  Shaftesbury  that:  "Die  Tugend 
ist  sittliche  Schoenheit.  Sie  ist  die  innere  Einheit  und  Ord- 
nung,  das  glueckliche  Gleichgewicht  aller  Kraefte  und 
Neigungen,  Lebensharmonie."  This  is  representative  of  a 
common  view  of  Shaftesbury's  conception  of  goodness.  It 
is,  however,  only  partially  true.  It  does  not  go  far  enough. 
It  is  from  Shaftesbury's  standpoint  goodness  without  its 
foundation,  and  so  not  a  genuine  enduring  thing.  Shaftes- 
bury not  only  demands  harmonious  relationship  subjectively 
existent,  but  a  harmony  of  this  inner  status  with  the  objective 
whole  of  which  the  individual  is  an  inseparable  part.  The 
whole  is  the  final  standard  of  moral  appeal. 

The  whole  not  only  furnishes  the  standard  of  goodness, 
it  is  conducive  to  and  conservative  of  it.  It  thus  gives  it 
stability  and  reliability.  This  Shaftesbury  points  out  vari- 
ously. Starting  with  the  insistence  that  virtue  is  love  of  order, 
he  maintains  consistently  that  this  admiration'  will  grow  in 
strength  in  proportion  to  the  dimensions  of  the  object  in 
which  the  order  is  found.  Accordingly,  it  will  reach  its 
heighth  of  fervor  when  exercised  "in  so  ample  and  mag- 

19 


nificent  a  subject  as  the  whole  which  exhibits  a  divine  order" 
(Char.,  I.,  279).  This  influence  of  the  whole  he  further 
indicates  in  the  claim  that  on  the  physical  side  man  must  have 
exercise  of  his  parts  to  keep  him  whole  and  healthy.  It  is 
not  otherwise  on  his  inner  or  spiritual  side.  Nothing,  says 
he,  is  so  essential  to  it  as  exercise.  This  it  finds  in  social  or 
natural  affection,  which  is  affection  for  the  whole.  Such 
affection  alone  furnishes  real  enjoyment  and  thus  conduces  to 
a  life  that  is  moral. 

This  determinative  moral  value  of  the  whole  is  even 
more  evident,  according  to  Shaftesbury' s  teaching,  in  his  con- 
ception of  conscience,  as  has  already  been  explained.  To 
him  conscience  is,  according  to  its  experience  of  pleasure  or 
pain,  expressive  of  one's  harmony  or  disharmony  with  the 
whole.  The  offensiveness  and  grievousness  of  the  dishar- 
mony is  such  that  through  the  pain  it  inflicts  in  conscience 
the  whole  compels  a  recognition  of  itself  and  thus  contributes 
to  the  maintenance  of  virtue.  Indeed,  disregard  of  the  whole 
makes  goodness  uncertain  or  even  destroys  it.  A  friendship 
confined  to  an  individual  is  unreliable.  It  must  have  as  back- 
ground affection  for  the  whole  to  possess  constancy  and 
permanency.  Every  immorality  and  enormity  of  life,  says 
he  (Char.,  II.,  345),  is  caused  by  neglect  of  this  considera- 
tion. It  is  on  this  ground  of  the  evil  of  a  partial  view  of 
things  that  Shaftesbury  condemned  Egyptian  animal  worship 
as  containing  a  possible  unsocial  tendency. 

Determining  virtue  by  giving  it  norm  and  stability  the 
whole  further  favors  it  by  effecting  the  pleasure  or  happiness 
which  is  its  concomitant.  Pleasure  or  happiness,  according 
to  Shaftesbury,  is  impossible  in  a  state  of  separateness  and 
disunion.  Loneliness  cannot  well  or  long  enjoy  anything. 
Its  enjoyment  is  not  real  and  enduring.  It  would  soon  be 
cloyed  and  grow  uneasy  till  it  could  impart  and  thus  share 
its  experience.  This  is  a  condition  which  can't  be  disregarded 
long  without  being  avenged.  Nature  disregarded  in  this 
will  break  out  (Char.,  I.,  310).  Persistent  disregard  of 
nature  or  the  claims  of  the  whole  will  entail  the  greatest  of 
miseries.  Since  this  is  so,  Shaftesbury  takes  it  as  a  mark  of 
the  ruling  wisdom  in  nature  by  which  it  leads  private  interest 
to  an  interest  in  the  general  good  and  thus  to  virtue. 

The  conception  of  a  harmonious  whole  is  for  Shaftesbury 
the  solvent  of  the  problem  presented  by  the  diverse  and  con- 


20 


flicting  affections  of  human  life.     He  recognizes  three  ex- 
pressions of  these  affections  (Char.,  I.,  286)  : 

1 i )  Natural  affections  which  lead  to  the  good  of  the 
public; 

(2)  Self-affections  which  lead  only  to  the  good  of  the 
private ; 

(3)  Such  as  tend  to  the  good  of  neither  but  contrariwise 
and  are  unnatural. 

One  of  these  is  fundamental  to  all  conduct  as  its  moving 
cause.  We  are  moved  in  the  direction  of  our  strongest  affec- 
tions or  passions  measured  either  in  force  or  number.  But 
how  prevent  a  consequent  conflict?  Nature  prevents  this  auto- 
matically through  the  assertion  of  its  harmonious  relation- 
ships. There  is  an  inner  harmony  as  well  as  an  outer  one/\ 
Disturbance  of  this  by  excess  in  any  direction,  either  good  or 
ill,  entails  unhappiness.  We  must  foster  self-regarding  af- 
fections. Insufficient  attention  in  this  direction  is  vicious 
with  reference  to  the  design  and  end  of  nature  in  the  whole. 
She  has  attached  extreme  care  to  single  parts  of  our  consti- 
tution by  safe-guarding  them  with  particular  solicitude.  She 
certainly  must  intend  the  same  relatively  to  the  whole, 
whether  of  body  or  soul.  Excess  in  the  direction  of  egoistic 
interest  is  bad  in  that  it  destroys  the  balance  of  harmony  be- 
tween self,  the  part,  and  the  whole.  This  whole  is  inescapable 
and  must  be  regarded,  but  not  exclusively.  Self  must  be  re- 
garded also.  Reconciliation  obtains  in  the  fact  that  they  are 
not  actually  dissevered,  but  so  connected  organically  that 
proper  devotion  to  self  advances  the  whole  which  reacts 
beneficially  upon  the  part,  and  due  devotion  to  the  whole 
directly  furthers  the  part  which  it  contains. 

The  whole  thus  employed  by  Shaftesbury  does  not  for 
him  exhaust  reality.  Viewed  in  and  by  itself  it  is  simply  an 
articulated  system  of  relationships  in  which  everything  is 
essential  to  everything  else.  But  it  is  a  vast  machine-like 
structure  that  also  stands  in  a  relation.  It  is  representative 
of  a  "sovereign  genius  and  first  beauty"  (Char.,  II.,  40),  to 
which  it  is  related.  So,  while  in  a  sense  Shaftesbury  is 
dualistic  in  positing  a  supreme  mind  and  something  that  is  ob- 
jective to  it,  that  supreme  mind  is  part  of  a  greater  whole 
from  which  it  seems  to  be  inseparable.  He  therefore  pre- 
sents what  might  be  termed  a  modified  dualism. 

It  is  interesting  to  note  the  significance  of  Shaftesbury's 


21 


conception  of  the  whole  in  his  life.  Mandeville,  with  charac- 
teristic cynicism  (Fowler,  Shaftesbury  and  Hutcheson,  142), 
regarded  Shaftesbury's  interest  in  a  larger  whole  as  merely 
theoretical,  and  so  calls  on  him  to  give  evidence  of  it  "not 
by  living  in  retirement  and  inactivity,  but  by  serving  his  coun- 
try in  the  field  or  by  attempting  to  retrieve  its  ruined 
finances."  Vater  (Pope  and  Shaftesbury,  13)  very  cor- 
rectly brands  this  attempted  detraction  as  an  expression  of 
the  partisan  prejudice  of  one  whose  exaggeration  overlooked 
the  illness  of  the  one  criticised  and  his  political  conditions. 
Shaftesbury's  love  of  the  generality  was  no  mere  pretty  theory 
but  a  vital  principle.  This  is  testified  by  others  with  Vater, 
who  says  (Ibid.,  17)  that  Shaftesbury  possessed  in  rich  meas- 
ure the  patriotism  he  so  highly  praised.  Apart  from  such 
testimony  of  later  students  of  Shaftesbury  his  own  words  will 
be  accepted  in  vindication  of  his  patriotic  virtue  in  the  largest 
sense  by  those  who  know  the  genuineness  of  his  modesty,  his 
unswerving  single-eyed  devotion  to  truth,  and  his  nobility  of 
character  in  general.  In  a  letter  to  his  friend  Furley  (Orig- 
inal Letters,  271),  dated  July,  1712,  the  year  before  his 
death,  he  attributes  his  weakened  health  to  cares  and  labors 
borne  in  behalf  of  the  good  interest  and  cause  of  liberty  and 
mankind.  On  other  occasions  he  wrote  to  the  same  friend 
(Ibid.,  207) ,  "I  know  no  better  use  for  my  life  than  to  spend 
it  for  one's  country,  and  for  mankind,  and  if  I  thought  my 
life  of  no  use  to  the  public,  I  should  not  be  at  the  pains  I  am 
at  of  preserving  it."  And  again,  when  in  poor  health,  he 
wrote  (Ibid.,  242),  "Whilst  I  can  have  any  share  (be  it 
ever  so  little)  in  the  service  of  my  friends,  my  country,  or 
mankind,  I  can  be  contented  with  any  life,  any  health,  or  any 
constitution  ever  so  bad,  and  can  live  as  happily  thus  as  at  any 
time  of  my  life."  In  view  of  such  professions,  which  repre- 
sent vital  convictions,  it  may  be  said  that  Shaftesbury's 
philosophy  was  no  mere  speculation,  but  an  expression  of  the 
man.  To  him  the  whole  as  a  universal,  harmonious  relation-  - 
ship  was  an  actuality.  Love  for  it  was  his  dominant  passion. 
This  basic  conception  of  Shaftesbury's  has  not,  as  already 
pointed  out,  been  duly  regarded,  but  along  with  other  im- 
portant convictions  of  his  has  wielded  great  influence  in  sup- 
plying to  others  the  dominant  note  or  determining  spirit  of 
their  literary  production.  Herder  in  his  "Naturhymnus," 
Thomson  more  conspicuously  in  "The  Seasons,"  which  in- 


22- 


spired  Tennyson,  and  others  may  be  said  to  have  derived  in- 
spiration and  suggestion  at  the  lips  of  "The  Moralists." 
Alexander  Pope  is,  as  has  been  extensively  recognized,  clearly 
the  largest  debtor.  His  poetry  is  not  only,  as  Stephen  says 
(Diet,  of  Nat.  Biog.,  Vol.  XLVL,  p.  124),  the  essence  of 
the  first  half  of  the  eighteenth  century,  but  in  its  more  im- 
portant parts  it  is  almost  literally  a  reproduction  of  Shaftes- 
bury.  To  show  this,  as  well  as  for  the  sake  of  the  greater 
emphasis  thereby  given  to  the  main  insistences  of  our  author, 
we  give  to  the  subject  a  little  more  particular  and  extended 
illustration. 

Like  Shaftesbury,  Pope  rears  the  structure  of  his  poetical 
teaching  upon  the  conception  of  a  whole  consisting  of  God 
and  Nature: 

UA11  are  but  parts  of  one  stupendous  whole, 
Whose  body  Nature  is,  and  God  the  soul." 

(Essay,  Epistle  I.) 

This  whole  exists  in  organic  inner  relation.  A  chain  of 
love  unites  all  below  and  all  above. 

"Nothing  is  foreign;  parts  relate  to  whole; 
One  all-extending,  all-preserving  Soul 
Connects  each  being,  greatest  with  the  least." 

(Ibid.,  III.) 

To  understand  a  part  requires  knowledge  of  the  whole  of 
which  it  is  a  part. 

"He,  who  through  vast  immensity  can  pierce, 
Sees  worlds  on  worlds  compose  one  universe, 
May  tell  why  Heaven  made  us  as  we  are."    (Ibid.,  I.) 

In  the  light  of  the  whole,  accordingly,  parts  lose  the  harsh- 
ness of  their  incongruity  which  is  only  seeming. 

"Respecting  man  whatever  wrong  we  call, 
May,  must  be  right,  as  relative  to  all."     (Ibid.) 

Our  failure  to  see  this  reflects  our  ignorance.  In  which  case 
it  may  be  said: 

"All  nature  is  but  art,  unknown  to  thee; 
All  chance,  direction  which  thou  canst  not  see ; 

23 


All  discord,  harmony  not  understood ; 
All  partial  evil,  universal  good."     (Ibid.) 

Larger  knowledge  sufficiently  inclusive  to  embrace  the  whole 
would  discover  the  relativity  and  appropriateness  of  all 
things  within  that  whole.  This  Pope  implies  thus : 

"When  the  proud  steed  shall  know  why  man  restrains 
His  fiery  course,  or  drives  him  o'er  the  plains; 
When  the  dull  ox,  why  now  he  breaks  the  clod, 
Is  now  a  victim,  and  now  Egypt's  god, 
Then  shall  man's  pride  and  dullness  comprehend 
His  actions,  passions,  being's  use  and  end."     (Ibid.) 

This  differently  stated  declares  that  just  as  we  understand 
what  is  incomprehensible  to  the  brutes  because  of  their  lim- 
itation, so  spirits  higher  than  we  are  in  the  scale  of  existence 
may  comprehend  what  is  yet  unintelligible  to  us. 

"Heaven  from  all  creatures  hides  the  book  of  fate, 
From  brutes  what  men,  from  men  what  spirits  know." 

(ibid.,  i.) 

Our  failure  to  find  a  thread  of  purpose  winding  through  the 
mazes  of  the  universe  is,  therefore,  partly  our  ignorance,  but 
chiefly,  as  has  been  said,  our  pride,  which  exaggerating  our 
self-importance,  depreciates  the  world,  and  attempts  to  render 
it  subservient  to  us  instead  of  ourselves  to  it.  This  Pope 
castigates  by  asking: 

"Has  God,  thou  fool !  worked  solely  for  thy  good, 
Thy  joy,  thy  pastime,  thy  attire,  thy  food?" 

(Ibid.,  III.) 

It  is  true  that  "Man,  like  the  generous  vine,  supported  lives" 
(Ibid.),  but  to  think  all  made  for  one  and  not  one  for  all  is, 
says  Pope,  to  fall  short  of  reason.  "God  framed  a  whole, 
the  whole  to  bless."  (Ibid. ) 

"The  Universal  Cause 
Acts  not  by  partial,  but  by  general  laws ; 
And  makes  what  happiness  we  justly  call, 
Subsist  not  in  the  good  of  one,  but  all."     (Ibid.,  IF.) 

24 


Consistently  with  his  teaching  of  the  supremacy  of  the 
whole  as  Shaftesbury  conceived  it,  Pope  emphasizes  the  pre- 
cedence of  the  whole  over  the  part.  There  are  not  nor  can 
there  be  any  favorites  or  exceptions  that  may  be  heeded  by 
the  operation  of  the  External  Cause.  (Ibid.,  IV.} 

In  the  more  particular  reference  to  his  teaching  with  re- 
gard to  the  individual,  Pope  presents  a  literal  reproduction 
of  Shaftesbury.  Like  our  author,  he  is  antipodal  to  Hobbes. 
His  view  of  man's  primitive  condition  is  not  of  elements  at 
war  with  one  another.  For  him  "the  state  of  nature  was 
the  reign  of  God."  (Ibid.,  III.)  There  were,  'tis  true,  self- 
regarding  elements  at  the  beginning,  but  there  were  also  social 
proclivities  which  served  as  a  bond  of  union.  Hence, 

"Self-love  and  social  at  her  birth  began, 
Union  the  bond  of  all  things,  and  of  man."     (Ibid.) 

For  "true  self-love  and  social  are  the  same."     (Ibid.,  IV.) 

Finally,  in  his  view  of  the  significance  of  virtue  and  vice 
to  the  individual,  Pope  is  at  one  with  Shaftesbury.  There  is 
reward  and  punishment  not,  however,  as  the  goal  but  as  the 
result  of  conduct.  This  result  is  always  to  be  sought  for  in 
kind.  Spiritual  causes  must  have  spiritual  consequences.  The 
reward  of  virtue  is,  therefore,  not  bread  but  happiness.  And 
this  is  the  greatest  reward. 

"What  nothing  earthly  gives  or  can  destroy, 
The  soul's  calm  sunshine,  and  the  heartfelt  joy, 
Is  virtue's  prize."     (Ibid.,  IF.) 

One  self-approving  hour  of  such  outweighs  years  of  other 
recognition.  Not  only  is  this  true  according  to  Pope,  but 
with  Shaftesbury  he  further  maintains  that  "Virtue  alone  is 
happiness  below.  (Ibid.) 

With  this  evidence  of  Shaftesbury's  doctrine  of  the  whole, 
together  with  other  subordinate  teachings  logically  derived 
therefrom  employed  by  Pope,  which  might  be  even  more  ex- 
tensively illustrated,  the  judgment  of  Herder  (cf.  Pope  and 
Shaftesbury,  Vater,  22),  is  justified,  that  uohne  die  Moralis- 
ten  haette  Pope  die  besten  Verse  seines  Essay  on  Man 
schwerlich  geschrieben." 

25 


COMPARATIVE  VALUE  OF  SHAFTESBURY'S 
TEACHING 

C.  Having  now  Shaftesbury's  teaching  of  the  whole  in 
mind,  we  see  at  once  the  irreconcilable  difference  between  him 
and  Hobbes  in  the  nature  and  value  of  their  respective  ethical 
positions.  Hobbes  derives  his  norm  of  ethical  conduct  from 
a  consideration  of  the  individual;  Shaftesbury  deduces  his 
from  the  universal.  To  Hobbes  the  individual  is  all-im- 
portant, to  Shaftesbury  it  is  the  generality.  Shaftesbury,  in 
the  spirit  of  Spinoza  or  Leibnitz,  views  the  individual  from 
the  standpoint  of  the  universal.  The  universal  harmony  must 
prevail.  For  this  harmony  is  the  essence  of  virtue  and  man 
must  keep  himself  in  articulation  with  it.  The  ethical  value 
of  his  life  is  to  be  measured  by  the  extent  of  its  conformation 
with  the  general  life.  "It  is  shame  and  folly  to  wish  against 
the  whole."  (Regimen,  93.)  "The  good  of  mankind,  that 
alone  shouldst  thou  intend  and  that  perform  as  far  as  in  thee 
lies."  (Ibid.,  72.)  When  personal  interest  and  that  of  the 
public  are  in  opposition,  one  is  far  from  virtue  (Ibid.,  73). 
The  appeal  of  virtue  in  Hobbes'  teaching  is  strictly  personal, 
in  that  of  Shaftesbury  it  is  as  conspicuously  impersonal.  In 
the  one  it  is  a  base  self-assertion,  in  the  other  a  sublime  self- 
surrender.  With  Hobbes  man  is  born  without  morality  and 
invents  it.  With  Shaftesbury  man  is  born  as  a  moral  possibil- 
ity and  is  left  to  realize  and  maintain  it. 

Shaftesbury's  superiority  to  Hobbes  is  not  inferior  to  that 
with  which  he  may  be  credited  in  comparison  with  Locke.  To 
both  Hobbes  and  Locke  morality  is  a  manufacture  with  only 
this  difference,  that  while  to  one  it  is  a  human  handiwork,  to 
the  other  it  is  of  Divine  origin.  Locke  might  be  regarded 
as  rendering  morality  more  impressive  by  reason  of  its  higher 
ultimate  source,  but  this  result  will  only  obtain  with  the  un- 
thinking. Moral  sanction  to  be  valid  must  in  the  last 
analysis  be  something  inherent  and  not  superimposed.  Be- 
cause a  god  commands  the  moral  might  make  it  more  certain 
of  acceptance  and  realization  from  its  association  with  power 
and  its  suggestion  of  penalty,  but  this  would  be  to  make 
morality  unmoral.  In  Kant's  phraseology  it  would  be  legality 
but  not  morality.  Further,  morality  is  not  moral  merely 
when  imposed  by  Divine  will  even  apart  from  promise  or 
penalty.  What  assurance  have  we  that  this  Divine  will  does 

26 


not  act  arbitrarily  in  the  matter,  which  again  would  rob 
morality  of  moral  quality  by  exposing  it  to  the  suspicion  of 
being  capricious.  Specific  moral  enactment  may  express 
arbitrary  determination,  but  fundamentally  morality  must  be 
absolute  and  independent.  Shaftesbury  finally  meets  this  re- 
quirement in  contrast  to  Hobbes  and  Locke  by  removing  the 
source  and  sanction  of  morality  from  both  human  and  Divine 
origin  and  placing  it,  as  has  been  shown,  in  the  universal  con- 
stitution of  things  themselves.  He  would  have  said  in  the 
language  of  Stephen  (Science  of  Ethics,  142),  that  "the 
moral  law  is  as  independent  of  the  legislature  as  the  move- 
ments of  the  planets."  He  actually  went  a  step  further  than 
this  and  taught  that  the  moral  law  is  independent  even  of 
Divine  legislation.  It  is  antecedent  to  man  and  even  ob- 
ligatory upon  God  if  He  is  to  subsist  in  harmonious  relation- 
ship with  the  rest  of  existence.  This  view  may  not,  as  was 
the  case,  be  acceptable  to  the  opponent  of  the  deistic  position 
as  exemplified  by  Shaftesbury.  It  may  be  construed  as 
derogatory  to  the  Deity.  It  need  not,  however,  be  so  con- 
strued. It  would  be  a  more  and  not  less  creditable  Deity 
who  recognized  and  accepted  the  appeal  and  obligation  of 
the  moral  law  and  gave  himself  to  be  its  mouthpiece.  And 
if  the  fear  were  persisted  in  that  the  implication  of  Shaftes- 
bury's  position  lowered  the  dignity  of  the  Deity,  it  could  be 
urged  by  way  of  compensation  that  it  exalted  the  worth  and 
appeal  of  morality.  And  if  we  are  concerned,  as  we  should 
be,  with  man's  salvation  and  not  with  God's  safety,  the  posi- 
tion maintained  by  Shaftesbury  is  incomparably  more  de- 
sirable. It  is  no  irreverence  to  say  that  man's  chief  concern 
is  man.  Nor  is  any  irreverence  implied  to  say  from  this 
standpoint  that  God  may  take  care  of  Himself. 

But  virtue,  according  to  Shaftesbury,  is  not  mere  har- 
mony between  the  individual  and  the  universal.  He  saw 
clearly  and  emphasized  appropriately  that  moral  merit  is 
not  to  be  credited  to  mechanical  action,  but  is  allowable  only 
to  that  which  is  conscious  and  intentional.  Shaftesbury 
makes  here  an  interesting  and  novel  distinction  between  good- 
ness and  virtue.  He  terms  that  goodness  by  which  a  creature 
is  carried  as  result  of  natural  temper  or  bent  of  affections 
towards  good  and  against  evil.  (Characteristics,  I.,  p.  250.) 
It  must  also  be  attended  with  some  affection.  (Ibid.,  247.) 
Such  goodness  lies  within  the  reach  and  capacity  of  all  sensible 
creatures.  (Ibid.,  251.)  Virtue,  on  the  other  hand,  is 

27 


higher  and  better.  It  involves  goodness  and  has  an  addi- 
tional element.  To  be  virtuous  one  must  exercise  conscious 
choice  based  upon  a  knowledge  of  conflicting  alternatives. 
If  a  creature  be  generous,  kind,  constant,  etc.,  and  yet  cannot 
reflect  upon  what  he  does  or  sees  others  do  so  as  to  take  notice 
of  what  is  worthy  or  honest,  and  make  that  notice  or  concep- 
tion of  worth  and  honesty  to  be  an  object  of  his  affection, 
he  has  not  the  character  of  being  virtuous.  (Ibid.,  253.) 

The  greater  the  effort  implied  in  choosing,  the  greater 
the  virtue.  (Ibid.,  256.)  And  such  moral  worth  is  attrib- 
utable only  to  man.  (Ibid.,  251.) 

Since  virtue  is  choice  between  conflicting  alternatives, 
there  arises  further  qualification  of  virtue  by  motive.  With- 
out motive  virtue  degenerates  into  a  mere  mechanical  good- 
ness, but  the  motive  must  be  moral.  To  be  moral  it  must  be 
social  in  purport,  tending  to  the  general  good,  and  it  must  be 
without  personal  reference  in  the  end  to  be  obtained.  In  the 
spirit  of  Kant,  Shaftesbury  makes  virtue  an  end  in  itself.  It 
must  not  embody  a  spirit  of  commercialism  or  speculation. 
If  virtue  be  not  really  estimable  in  itself,  he  says,  I  can  see 
nothing  estimable  in  following  it  for  the  sake  of  a  bargain. 
If  the  love  of  doing  good  be  not  of  itself  a  good  and  right 
inclination,  I  know  not  how  there  can  possibly  be  such  a 
thing  as  goodness  or  virtue.  (Ibid.,  I.,  p.  66.)  Nor  is  the 
matter  of  the  moral  value  of  motive  altered  by  its  removal  to 
a  distance.  Shaftesbury  protests  strongly  in  the  interest  of 
the  integrity  of  virtue  against  the  introduction  of  the  selfish 
motive  of  reward  hereafter.  "If  a  saint  had  no  other  virtue 
than  what  was  raised  in  him  by  the  same  objects  of  reward 
and  punishment  in  a  more  distant,  state,  I  know  not  whose 
love  or  esteem  he  might  gain  besides,  but  for  my  own  part 
I  should  never  think  him  worthy  of  mine.  (Ibid.,  p.  85.) 
Goodness  out  of  fear  of  deity  or  hope  of  reward  is  not  good- 
ness. (Ibid.,  p.  267.) 

There  needs  be  said  that  the  goodness  with  which  Shaftes- 
bury credits  man  as  a  native  endowment  is  not  an  accom- 
plishment but  a  faculty.  He  may  be  said  to  be  born  good 
to  the  end  that  he  might  become  virtuous.  Goodness,  ac- 
cording to  Shaftesbury,  being  the  possibility,  virtue  the 
realization.  And  it  is  here  that  we  have  what  might  be 
termed  Shaftesbury's  most  characteristic  ethical  teaching  and 
contribution  to  the  study. 

28 


THE   MORAL  SENSE 

D.  To  realize  the  significance  and  value  of  this  we  must 
start  with  Shaftesbury's  insistence  of  the  naturalness  and 
inherency  of  moral  distinctions  in  the  universe.  Morality  is 
neither  divinely  created  nor  humanly  manufactured,  it  is 
original  and  substantial.  Nor  is  it,  to  begin  with,  subjective 
to  man,  but  objective.  Accordingly,  the  question  may  be 
raised,  in  fact,  is  unavoidable,  how  does  man  arrive  at  knowl- 
edge of  this  morality?  How  is  the  mediation  between  the 
objective  and  the  subjective  in  the  case  effected?  This,  for 
Shaftesbury,  is  easily  brought  about  by  his  unique  conception 
of  morality. 

Morality  is  commonly  taken  to  imply  a  spiritual  attitude 
or  disposition  of  the  individual  in  matters  pertaining  to  con- 
duct. It  is  primarily  a  matter  of  motive.  Without  this  sub- 
jective element  morality  is  a  kind  of  mechanics,  a  beautiful 
counterfeit  without  a  soul.  In  Shaftesbury's  moral  scheme 
morality  is  primarily  and  principally  objective  to  man,  some- 
thing that  he  can  perceive  and  imitate,  or  adapt  himself  to. 
It  is  a  harmonious  relationship,  a  beauty  of  conduct  the  at- 
tractiveness of  which  consists  in  the  harmonious  articulation 
of  its  parts  or  purposes  to  one  another,  and  to  the  rest  of 
things  besides.  "There  is,  says  Shaftesbury  (Characteristics, 
II. ,  p.  137),  in  certain  figures  a  natural  beauty  which  the  eye 
finds  as  soon  as  the  object  is  presented  to  it.  And  is  there 
not  as  natural  a  beauty  of  actions?"  Indeed,  "the  most 
natural  beauty  in  the  world  is  honesty  and  moral  truth" 
(Ibid.,  I.,  p.  94).  Beauty  and  good  are  one  and  the  same 
(Ibid.,  II.,  p.  128).  There  is  no  real  good  beside  the  en- 
joyment of  beauty,  and  there  is  no  enjoyment  of  beauty  be- 
side what  is  good.  (Ibid.,  141.) 

The  substantive  independent  existence  of  the  good  as  a 
moral  standard  cannot  be  more  emphatically  put  than  when 
Shaftesbury  exalts  it  into  a  standard  of  moral  measurement 
of  the  Deity  Himself.  This  he  does  when  he  says:  "Who- 
ever thinks  there  is  a  God  and  pretends  formally  to  believe 
that  He  is  just  and  good,  must  suppose  that  there  is  in- 
dependently such  a  thing  as  justice  and  injustice,  truth  and 
falsehood,  right  and  wrong,  according  to  which  he  pronounces 
that  God  is  just,  righteous,  and  true.  If  the  mere  will,  de- 
cree, or  law  of  God  be  said  absolutely  to  constitute  right  and 

29 


wrong,  then  are  these  latter  words  of  no  significance."  (Ibid., 
L,  264.)  In  other  words,  God's  moral  determinations  are  to 
be  measured  by  an  objective  moral  standard. 

How  does  man  arrive  at  this  objective  morality  of  a 
beautiful  harmonious  relationship?  Here  Shaftesbury  has 
made  his  most  striking  contribution  to  the  history  of  ethics. 
Leslie  Stephen  (Free-thinking,  p.  265)  calls  it  Shaftesbury's 
invention.  According  to  Shaftesbury,  man  enters  the  world 
dowered  with  a  many-sided  sensitiveness  to  various  forms  of 
beauty.  Fundamentally,  all  beauty  is  harmony,  which  ex- 
presses itself  variously.  There  is  a  beauty  of  harmony  in 
sounds,  another  in  sights,  and  another  in  conduct.  To  each 
of  these  there  is  a  corresponding  sense.  The  beautiful  in 
sights  is  perceived  by  the  eye,  the  beautiful  in  sound  by  the 
ear,  and  the  beautiful  in  conduct  by  a  moral  sense,  or  taste. 
This  moral  sense  Stephen  (Ibid.,  267)  describes  as  "merely 
a  particular  case  of  that  sense  by  which  we  perceive  the  all- 
prevailing  harmony.  That  harmony,  as  revealed  to  our 
imagination,  produces  the  sense  of  the  beautiful;  as  partially 
apprehended  by  our  reason  it  produces  philosophy;  and  as 
embodied  in  the  workings  of  human  nature  it  gives  rise  to 
the  moral  sense."  This  description  of  Stephen's  is  excellent 
but  for  the  qualification  that  the  harmony  existing  and  ex- 
perience does  not  produce  the  several  corresponding  senses. 
They  are  part  and  parcel  of  man's  native  endowment.  They 
are  human  capabilities.  The  diverse  expressions  of  the  beau- 
tiful are  merely  occasions  of  the  exercise  of  these  capabilities. 
They  are  simply  different  exhibitions  of  the  same  fundamental 
responsiveness,  according  to  the  respective  natures  of  the 
stimuli  presented. 

The  naturalness  and  inherency  of  this  moral  sense,  as 
part  of  man's  native  equipment,  Shaftesbury  has  plainly  em- 
phasized. "Sense  of  right  and  wrong  is  as  natural  to  us  as 
natural  affection  and  is  a  first  principle  in  our  constitution  and 
make.  There  is  no  speculative  opinion,  persuasion  or  belief 
which  is  capable  immediately  or  directly  to  exclude  or  destroy 
it."  (Characteristics,  I.,  260.)  Not  only  is  there  no  specu- 
lative opinion,  persuasion,  or  belief  which  is  capable  imme- 
diately or  directly  to  exclude  or  destroy  this  moral  sense,  but, 
as  if  growing  in  strength  of  assurance  with  regard  to  it, 
Shaftesbury,  a  little  later  on,  says,  "  'Tis  impossible  that  this 
can  instantly  or  without  much  force  and  violence  be  effaced 

30 


or  struck  out  of  the  natural  temper  even  by  means  of  the  most 
extravagant  belief  or  opinion  in  the  world."  (Ibid.,  261.) 
And  much  later  still  (Ibid.,  II.,  344)  he  maintains  that  man's 
moral  sense  is  not  only  natural  and  essential,  but  that  "You 
can't  get  rid  of  it." 

But  this  moral  sense  is  not  to  be  regarded  as  a  fully 
formed  faculty  with  which  man  enters  life  any  more  than  any 
other  with  which  he  is  endowed  to  face  life  with  its  manifold 
possibilities  and  duties.  In  the  spirit  of  Shaftesbury's  familiar 
classicism,  we  might  say  it  does  not  spring  full-formed  like 
Minerva  from  the  brow  of  Zeus.  Like  sight,  like  hearing, 
like  man's  other  senses,  his  moral  sense,  differing  from  the 
others  in  being  dissociated  from  any  physical  organ  and  in 
being  thus  purely  spiritual,  starts  as  they  do  as  a  rudimentary 
possibility  requiring  development.  It  requires  use,  practice, 
culture  and  criticism.  Accordingly,  it  is  educable,  and  if  not 
educated  will  remain  stunted  or  become  through  wrong  de- 
velopment perverted.  Its  education  should  be  begun  early, 
when  material  is  plastic,  in  which  case  it  is  effected  for  us  by 
discreet  sympathetic  teachers.  It  can  be  later  continued  and 
furthered  by  ourselves.  It  is  in  keeping  with  this  opinion  that 
Shaftesbury  says  (Characteristics,  II.,  p.  266)  that,  in  this 
matter,  "the  youth  alone  are  to  be  regarded.  The  rest  are 
confirmed  and  hardened  in  their  way.  Something  should 
therefore  be  thought  of  in  behalf  of  our  generous  youths 
towards  correcting  their  taste  or  relish  in  the  concerns  of 
life."  Education  of  the  moral  sense  is  so  sure  and  effective 
that  thereby  "such  an  opinion  of  good  could  be  settled  in  our- 
selves as  would  secure  an  invariable,  agreeable,  and  just  taste 
in  life  and  manners  (Ibid.,  p.  272).  The  man  who  repre- 
sents the  result  of  the  education  of  the  moral  sense  in  keeping 
with  Shaftesbury's  idea  will  be  so  disposed  morally  that  he 
will  respond  to  moral  appeal  with  the  same  automatic  cer- 
tainty as  obtains  in  the  reaction  of  any  bodily  sense  to  its 
appropriate  stimulus. 

Shaftesbury  abundantly  encourages  the  cultivation  of  the 
moral  sense  by  placing  in  clear  outline  its  stimulative  value  to 
conduct.  This  taste,  says  he  (Ibid.,  II.,  344),  determines 
goodness  where  opportunity  is  given  it  to  operate.  "With- 
out it  there  is  no  incentive  to  morality"  (Ibid.,  p.  265 ) .  For 
'Tis  not  merely  what  we  call  principle,  but  a  taste  which 
governs  man.  They  may  think  for  certain  'this  is  right,  or 

31 


that  wrong,'  they  may  believe  'this  a  crime,  or  that  a  sin,  this 
punishable  by  man,  or  that  by  God,'  yet  if  the  savour  of 
things  lies  cross  to  honesty;  if  the  fancy  be  florid  and  the  ap- 
petite high  towards  the  subaltern  beauties  and  lower  order  of 
worldly  symmetries  and  proportions,  the  conduct  infallibly 
turns  this  latter  way."  "Even  conscience,  such  as  is  owing  to 
religious  discipline,  will  make  but  a  slight  figure  where  this 
taste  is  set  amiss.  (Ibid.,  p.  265.)  This  taste  is  at  last  what 
will  influence.  (Ibid.,  p.  266.)  In  view  of  the  significance 
of  the  moral  taste  as  here  indicated,  the  high  importance  at- 
tached to  it  in  this  paper  is  abundantly  justified.  Shaftes- 
bury  himself  regarded  his  teaching  of  the  moral  sense  as 
among  his  most  important.  For  he  says  (Ibid.,  II.,  p.  344), 
that  to  demonstrate  the  reasonableness  of  a  proportionate 
taste  was  one  of  the  main  aims  of  his  work. 


SHAFTESBURY  AND   CUMBERLAND 

E.  Shaftesbury's  teaching  of  the  moral  taste  or  sense 
is  his  most  unique  contribution  to  ethical  history.  His  other 
positions,  more  or  less  modified,  appear  before  as  after  him, 
but  in  this  he  is  entirely  original.  The  only  antecedent  Eng- 
lish ethical  writer  with  whom  he  might  be  brought  into  com- 
parison is  Richard  Cumberland,  whose  DeLegibus  Naturae 
appeared  in  1672,  over  a  quarter  of  a  century  before  the  first 
appearance  of  Shaftesbury's  Inquiry  concerning  Virtue  and 
Merit.  (Sidgwick,  184.)  In  general,  Cumberland's  work 
can't  be  brought  into  comparison  with  that  of  Shaftesbury. 
Appearing  originally  in  Latin,  it  has  been  little  translated. 
It  is  long  drawn,  pedantic,  uninspiring,  and  wearisome,  while 
Shaftesbury  is,  as  a  rule,  lucid,  not  too  verbose,  dignified  in 
treatment,  and  always  exalted  and  inspiring  in  spirit.  But  we 
find  several  of  Shaftesbury's  main  contentions,  as,  for  in- 
stance, against  Locke  or  Hobbes,  anticipated,  and  more  or 
less  clearly  stated  by  Cumberland.  He  is  openly  in  oppo- 
sition to  Hobbes.  To  him  man  is  egoistic  by  nature  as  to 
Hobbes,  but  he  is  also  social.  This  sociality,  however,  is  not 
a  result  of  self-seeking  social  compact,  but  an  original  en- 
dowment. He  even  goes  so  far  as  to  maintain  (De  Legibus, 
p.  no)  that  men  universally  respect  the  general  good  earlier 
than  their  own.  Men  are  thus  good  by  nature.  The  larger 

32 


nature  of  which  man  is  part  is  also  good.  Goodness  is  in- 
herent therein,  but  this  quality,  according  to  Cumberland,  is 
not,  as  with  Shaftesbury,  original  and  substantive,  but  created. 
It  owes  its  existence  to  Divine  creation.  Cumberland  is  in 
complete  accord  with  Locke  in  regarding  morality  as  inherent 
in  the  universal  order  of  things,  but  by  Divine  determination. 
And  yet,  from  this  starting  point  wherein  he  differs  from 
Shaftesbury,  he  differs  more  widely  from  him  in  the  method 
of  arriving  at  a  knowledge  of  the  moral.  With  Cumberland 
it  is  entirely  rational  and  intellectual.  "Certain  proposi- 
tions," he  says  (Ibid.,  p.  39),  "of  unchangeable  truth  which 
direct  our  voluntary  actions  about  choosing  good  and  re- 
fusing evil,  and  impose  an  obligation  to  external  actions  even 
without  laws,  and  laying  aside  all  considerations  of  those 
compacts  which  constitute  civil  government,  are  from  the 
nature  of  things  and  of  men  necessarily  suggested  to  the 
minds  of  men  and  therefore  really  exist  there."  We  see  here 
the  recognition  of  moral  truth  to  be  entirely  intellectualistic. 
This  same  fact  receives  further  exhibition  and  confirmation  in 
Cumberland's  conception  of  conscience.  To  him  conscience 
is  entirely  a  matter  intellectual.  It  is  a  judicial  function  which 
is  necessarily  rational.  He  says  in  this  connection,  "Our  mind 
is  conscious  to  itself  of  all  its  own  actions.  It  sits  a  judge 
upon  its  own  actions  and  thence  procures  to  itself  either  tran- 
quillity and  joy  or  anxiety  and  sorrow.  In  this  power  of  the 
mind  and  the  actions  thence  arising  consists  the  whole  force 
of  conscience  by  which  it  proposes  laws  to  itself,  examines 
its  past,  and  regulates  its  future  conduct"  (De  Legibus,  112). 
According  to  this,  man's  apprehension  of  moral  truth  is 
mediated  by  an  intellectual  process,  and  the  result  of  the 
process  remains  intellectual.  Feeling  plays  no  part  and  is 
unnecessary.  With  Shaftesbury  there  is  no  intellectual 
mediation.  The  mind  does  not  first  sit  in  judgment  upon 
facts  to  determine  their  moral  signification.  But  oppositely, 
the  mental  recognition  is  a  later  process.  We  recognize  the 
good,  which  is  the  harmonious,  the  beautiful,  by  direct  in- 
tuition of  the  moral  sense.  We  are  by  nature  sensitive  to 
the  moral  as  the  photographer's  plate  is  to  the  pencilings  of 
the  light.  The  result  is  equally  direct  and  certain  in  either 
case.  To  indicate  more  strikingly  the  contrast  between  Cum- 
berland and  Shaftesbury  in  the  matter  of  moral  apprehen- 
sion, it  may  be  said  that  according  to  Cumberland  the  right 

33 


reaches  feeling  through  the  mind,  whereas  with  Shaftesbury 
it  reaches  the  mind  through  feeling.  Shaftesbury  differs  en- 
tirely from  Cumberland  in  this  aspect  of  his  ethical  teaching 
and  was  in  no  sense  even  in  the  least  suggestively  anticipated 
by  him. 

ETHICS  AND   RELIGION 

RELATION  IN  SHAFTESBURY' S  SYSTEM 

F.  What  in  Shaftesbury's  system  is  the  relation  of  ethics 
to  religion?  This  is  a  query  of  great  present-day  interest, 
but  one  in  which  Shaftesbury  does  not  give  us  any  informa- 
tion of  historical  value,  although  historically  he  is  of  great 
moral  value  in  the  history  of  the  controversy.  He  may  be 
credited  with  high  importance  as  conspicuous  among  the 
earlier  deists  for  having  emphasized  the  distinctness  of  ethics 
and  religion  and  thus  broadened  the  way  to  a  study  of  their 
respective  implications  and  mutual  relations.  Till  Shaftes- 
bury's time  the  subject  had,  as  he  mentions  (Characteristics, 
I.,  238),  been  little  examined.  It  was  still,  as  acknowledged 
by  him,  of  dangerous  speculation.  And  yet,  with  characteris- 
tic courage  for  which  he  was  always  conspicuous,  he  under- 
took the  investigation,  and  conducted  it  according  to  his  in- 
formation and  ability  with  exemplary  candor. 

Leslie  Stephen  has  well  said  (English  Thought,  II.,  p.  2) 
that  speculations  as  to  morality  inevitably  increase  as  the 
vision  of  God  becomes  faint.  This  may  be  true,  and  very 
likely  is  in  a  large  measure,  speaking  generally.  It  is,  how- 
ever, wholly  without  application  to  Shaftesbury.  He  was  in- 
tensely religious  in  the  true  signification  of  being  possessed 
and  guided  by  a  sense  of  the  Divine  supremacy  and  of  human 
responsibility.  This  consciousness  was  the  determining  in- 
fluence of  his  life.  In  writing  to  his  young  friend  at  Univer- 
sity, he  says  (Letters,  p.  4)  that  when  the  improvement  of 
our  minds  and  the  advancement  of  our  reason  is  what  we  aim 
at  to  fit  us  for  a  perfecter,  more  rational,  and  worthier  service 
of  God,  we  can  have  no  scruples  whether  or  no  the  work  be 
an  acceptable  one  to  Him.  But  where  neither  our  duty  to 
mankind,  nor  obedience  to  our  Creator  is  anyway  the  end  or 
object  of  our  studies  or  exercises,  be  they  ever  so  curious  or 
exquisite,  they  may  be  justly  styled  vain.  Shaftesbury  was 
not  faint  in  his  vision  of  God,  but  he  was,  as  Stephen  points 

34 


out  (English  Thought,  II.,  p.  25),  inimical  to  the  debased 
conception  of  deity  as  found  in  primitive  religious  teaching, 
both  Jewish  and  Christian,  as  it  still  obtained  in  his  day.  In 
this  respect  Shaftesbury's  insistence  is  not  yet  superfluous. 
But  it  is  not  correct  when  Stephen  says  elsewhere  (Free- 
thinking,  p.  256),  that  a  belief  in  God  is  an  essential  part  of 
Shaftesbury's  system,  and  that  such  belief  means  a  perception 
of  harmonious  order  (Stephen,  English  Thought,  II.,  p.  25). 
Shaftesbury's  avowed  aim  is  to  show  that  the  inseparableness 
of  God  and  ethics,  as  popularly  believed,  does  not  exist,  and 
one  can,  therefore,  have  a  perception  of  the  moral  relation- 
ship of  the  universe  without  perception  or  even  thought  of 
God.  Shaftesbury  is  a  firm  believer  in  God.  To  him  God  is 
a  reality  and  a  palpably  moving  spirit.  In  consonance  with 
the  other  deists  he  may  have  held  theoretically  to  the  distance 
of  the  Deity  in  certain  respects  from  His  universe,  but  this 
Deity  was  certainly  not  distant  from  Shaftesbury  himself,  as 
far  as  his  consciousness  was  concerned. 

Shaftesbury  maintains  the  existence  of  a  complete  sever- 
ance between  religion  and  ethics.  This  is  implied  in  his  teach- 
ing of  the  substantive  existence  of  goodness  as  a  universal 
harmony  by  which  even  God  is  determined  as  a  moral  being. 
Shaftesbury  anticipated  our  familiar  principle  that  men  act 
and  develop  conduct  before  they  speculate,  and  that  accord- 
ingly, as  he  says  (Characteristics,  I.,  p.  266),  "It  will  hardly 
be  questioned  that  it  is  possible  for  a  creature  capable  of 
using  reflection  to  have  a  liking  or  dislike  of  moral  actions, 
and  consequently  a  sense  of  right  and  wrong,  before  such 
time  as  he  may  have  any  settled  notion  of  a  God."  One  may 
continue  without  any  theistic  belief  and  yet  discover  a  high 
opinion  of  virtue.  (Ibid.,  275.)  Indeed,  so  certain  is  the 
precedence  of  ethics  to  religion,  that  the  religious  conscience 
depends  for  its  efficacy  upon  the  natural  conscience  (Ibid., 
p.  305).  So  Shaftesbury  says  that,  the  love  of  God  is  best 
attained  not  by  speculation  and  philosophy,  but  by  moral 
practice,  and  love  of  mankind,  and  a  study  of  their  interests. 
True  zeal  for  God,  or  religion,  must  be  supported  by  real  love 
for  mankind  (Letters,  pp.  8,  9).  In  other  words,  it  is 
Shaftesbury's  teaching  that  ethics  is  the  threshold  to  re- 
ligion. 

Religion,  therefore,  according  to  Shaftesbury,  is  not  es- 
sential to  ethics,  but  may  be  helpful,  and  so  supplementary. 

35 


Just  how  the  influence  is  exerted  and  effectuated  he  does  not 
say.  He  is  no  clearer  on  this  point  and  no  more  helpful  than 
Schleiermacher,  who,  discussing  the  same  problem  in  his 
''Discourses  on  Religion,"  leaves  us  hazy  as  to  a  solution. 
Shaftesbury  says  (Characteristics,  I.,  p.  270),  that,  "If  re- 
ligion creates  a  belief  that  the  ill  passions  no  less  than  their 
consequent  actions  are  the  objects  of  a  deity's  animadversion, 
'tis  certain  that  such  a  belief  must  prove  a  seasonable  remedy 
against  vice  and  be  in  a  particular  manner  advantageous  to 
virtue,"  and  that  thus  "virtue  finds  completion  in  piety" 
(Ibid.,  280).  But  he  fails  to  recognize  that  from  the  stand- 
point of  his  own  conception  of  virtue  the  result  of  such  piety 
would  not  be  virtuous,  although  it  might  be  religious.  Even 
if  such  a  religious  result  might  be  termed  ethical,  it  would  be 
impossible  to  see  how  it  would  imply  a  single  step  in  the  direc- 
tion of  virtue  as  conceived  in  Shaftesbury's  system.  Virtue 
on  religious  soil  is  submission  to  Divine  will.  In  Shaftes- 
bury's sense  it  is  spontaneous  response  and  adaptation  to  the 
appeal  of  a  harmony  universal.  So,  although  he  does  not 
disclaim  religion  and  appraises  it  as  supplementary  to  ethics, 
he  virtually  discards  it  by  failing  to  bring  it  into  logical  con- 
sistency with  his  ethical  system.  Kant's  adoption  of  religion 
as  a  regulative  principle  is  far  more  valuable,  although 
logically  scrutinized  is  not  much  more  tenable. 


CLASSIFICATION  OF  SHAFTESBURY 

G.  We  come  now,  finally,  in  our  presentation  of  Shaftes- 
bury's ethical  teaching  to  its  most  difficult  problem,  as  to  its 
classification  among  ethical  principles.  Shall  we  call  him 
hedonistic  or  intuitional?  We  find  nowhere  more  than  in- 
cidental reference  to  the  subject.  And  yet  it  is  interesting 
and  important.  A  cursory  reading  of  our  author  leaves  one 
at  the  close  thereof  confused  as  to  what  term  may  properly 
be  applied  to  him.  As  one  proceeds  in  the  text  he  finds  him- 
self constantly  vaccilating,  now  inclining  to  the  hedonistic 
position,  anon  to  the  more  rigorous  ethical  standard. 

A  decision  of  our  question  requires  not  only  a  considera- 
tion of  Shaftesbury's  expressed  opinions,  account  must  also 
be  taken  of  the  evident  spirit  with  which  his  writings  are  in- 

36 


spired  and  permeated.  In  his  more  formal,  purely  ethical 
writings,  there  is  a  decided  balance  in  favor  of  those  who 
would  claim  Shaftesbury  for  hedonism.  Goodness  is  com- 
monly interpreted  in  terms  of  pleasure  and  happiness;  as,  for 
instance,  "To  have  the  natural  affections  (such  as  are 
founded  in  love,  complacency,  good-will,  and  in  a  sympathy 
with  the  kind  or  species)  is  to  have  the  chief  means  and  power 
of  self-enjoyment.  To  want  these  is  certain  misery  and  ill" 
(Characteristics,  I.,  p.  293).  "The  natural  affections  being 
the  only  means  which  can  procure  a  constant  series  or  suc- 
cession of  the  mental  enjoyments,  are  the  only  means  which 
can  procure  a  certain  and  solid  happiness"  (Ibid.,  294). 
Shaftesbury  everywhere  identifies  virtue  with  pleasure. 
"Where  perfect  beauty  is,  there  alone  can  be  perfect  enjoy- 
ment" (Regimen,  pp.  59,  91).  He  even  urges  the  superior 
claim  of  pleasure  when  he  says,  "Every  creature  should  seek 
its  good  and  not  its  misery"  (Ibid.,  92),  in  which  goodness 
is  synonymous  with  happiness.  These  teachings  in  support 
of  hedonism  might  be  increased  to  greater  length  to  place 
Shaftesbury  in  the  ranks  of  the  school  of  hedonists.  There 
is,  however,  another  aspect  of  the  matter. 

While  Shaftesbury  abounds  in  interpretations  of  virtue 
in  terms  of  pleasure  and  the  like,  in  none  of  these  is  he  as 
emphatic  and  impressive  as  when  he  presents  morality  in 
its  intuitional  phase.  uln  the  characters  or  pictures  of  man- 
ners which  the  mind  of  necessity  figures  to  itself  and  carries 
about  with  it  the  heart  cannot  possibly  remain  neutral,  but 
constantly  takes  part  one  way  or  another"  (Characteristics, 
I.,  p.  252).  "There  is  a  power  in  harmony  proportion  and 
beauty  of  every  kind  which  naturally  captivates  the  heart" 
(Ibid.,  II.,  174).  "Integrity,  justice,  faith,  or  anything 
which  is  the  part  of  a  man  as  he  is  a  man,  is  his  only  end  and 
not  pleasure.  He  who  follows  pleasure  as  his  end  knows  not 
what  he  follows.  He  who  follows  virtue  as  his  end  knows 
what  he  follows"  (Regimen,  50).  Shaftesbury's  intuitional- 
ism is  implied  in  his  virtual  discarding  of  religion  from  the 
ethical  standpoint,  and  assigning  to  it  a  mere  supplementary 
and  subordinate,  although  not  indispensable,  position.  We 
see  it  further  exemplified,  even  more  emphatically,  in  his 
avowed  opposition  to  virtue  on  any  ground  of  utility.  In  a 
letter  to  Lord  Somers  (Regimen,  402)  he  pities  him  if  he 
cannot  find  good  attractive  for  its  own  sake.  He  speaks  with 

37 


like  contempt  of  all  whose  virtue  is,  as  he  would  call  it,  a 
commercial  bargaining.  "Those  who  can  be  conscious  of 
doing  no  good  but  what  they  are  frightened  or  bribed  into, 
can  make  but  a  sorry  account  of  it"  (Ibid,  345).  "Nothing 
is  truly  pleasing  or  satisfactory  but  what  is  acted  disinterest- 
edly, generously,  and  freely"  (Ibid}.  "The  certain  way  to 
make  the  most  of  life  is  to  do  the  most  good,  and  that  the 
most  generously,  throwing  aside  selfishness  and  merce- 
nariness"  (Ibid.,  346).  Shaftesbury  says  of  himself,  "The 
greatest  part  of  what  I  do  in  the  world  is  not  because  I  hope 
anything,  but  because  I  think  I  must  be  doing"  (Ibid.,  299). 
In  other  words,  he  finds  an  inherent  compulsion  in  duty  or 
virtue.  This  attitude  of  his  may  be  seen  to  attain  its  highest 
dignity  and  confirmation  when  he  urges  virtue  not  only  apart 
from  thought  or  expectation  of  reward,  but  even  where  it 
may  entail  not  only  absence  of  pleasure  but  even  possibility 
of  pain.  "It  is  diviner,"  says  he  (Characteristics,  27),  "to 
do  good  where  it  may  be  thought  inglorious  than  for  glory's 
sake."  If  now,  with  these  clear-cut  teachings,  one  takes  ac- 
count, as  has  been  maintained  should  be  done,  of  the  spirit 
of  Shaftesbury,  there  will  remain  no  doubt  as  to  the  purity 
of  his  intuitionalism,  at  least  in  its  intention.  In  his  less 
formal  teachings,  as  in  the  Philosophical  Regimen,  where  we 
see  mirrored,  as  it  were,  the  inner  life  of  the  man,  we  ex- 
perience a  very  palpable  spirit  of  moral  earnestness  to  which 
virtue  in  its  unclothed  beauty  wields  a  powerful  appeal  into 
consonance  with  which  he  struggles  hard  to  bring  himself. 
Further,  be  it  noted  that  while  Shaftesbury  commonly  places 
the  appeal  of  virtue  on  its  own  basis  without  other  reference 
to  pleasure  than  as  a  natural  result  of  virtuous  action,  he 
rarely  inculcates  virtue  for  the  sake  of  pleasure.  Indeed,  it 
is  evident  that  when  reference  is  made  to  pleasure  as  con- 
comitant of  virtue,  it  is  for  the  sake  of  the  virtue  and  not  the 
reverse.  He  tells  us  (Ibid.,  67)  that  there  is  a  necessity  for 
the  preservation  of  virtue.  To  this  end  it  should  be  thought 
to  have  no  quarrel  with  true  interest  and  self-enjoyment. 
He  is  willing  to  accept  happiness  as  an  aid  to  virtue,  but  not 
as  a  ground  therefor.  Virtue  is  to  be  the  supreme  concern. 

And  yet,  Shaftesbury's  intuitionalism  does  not  hold. 
Theoretically  it  is  valid,  practically  it  does  not  work.  In  his 
discussion  "Concerning  Virtue  or  Merit,"  he  discusses  the 
nature  of  virtue  and  leaves  with  the  reader  the  impression 

38 


that  it  is  something  that  needs  only  be  known  in  order  to  be 
done.  It  does  not  require  the  conventional  aid  of  religion, 
although  this  may  be  helpful.  It  is  represented  as  autonomous 
or  self-enacting.  Had  Shaftesbury  rested  the  case  here  it 
would  have  redounded  to  the  dignity  of  his  system  and  placed 
it  squarely  on  the  side  of  intuitionalism.  But  when  he  comes 
to  the  second  part  of  the  same  discussion,  in  Book  II.,  thereof 
he  belies  his  previous  teaching  by  asking  bluntly  and  plainly, 
at  the  very  outset,  "what  obligation  there  is  to  virtue,  or  what 
reason  to  embrace  it."  Thereafter  virtue  is  explained  in 
terms  of  pleasure.  It  is  presented  as  synonymous  therewith, 
although  he  does  not,  as  has  been  said,  urge  that  one  should 
be  guided  by  the  hedonistic  motive.  A  consistent  intuitional- 
ism would  exclude  in  a  discussion  of  virtue  the  question  of 
motive.  The  genuine  intuitionalist  requires  no  motive. 
Shaftesbury  himself  plainly  evidenced  his  consciousness  of 
the  weakness  or  limitation  of  the  intuitional  view  of  virtue 
when  he  said  (Characteristics,  I.,  p.  9),  "If  the  knowing  well 
how  to  expose  any  infirmity  or  vice  were  sufficient  security 
for  the  virtue  which  is  contrary,  how  excellent  an  age  might 
we  be  presumed  to  live  in."  We  are  reminded  here  of  the 
pathetic  echo  of  this  conviction  on  the  part  of  Bishop  Butler, 
whose  intended  intuitionalism  also  breaks  down  in  his  con- 
fession with  regard  to  the  limitation  of  the  moral  conscious- 
ness that  "Had  it  strength,  as  it  had  right,  had  it  power  as 
it  had  manifest  authority,  it-  would  absolutely  govern  the 
world"  (British  Moralists,  I.,  p.  217).  James  Martineau, 
in  his  "Types  of  Ethical  Theory"  (II.,  pp.  500,  508),  men- 
tions this  inconsistency  in  Shaftesbury's  system,  speaks  of  it 
properly  as  a  downward  step,  and  terms  it  "forgetfulness  of 
prior  positions"  (Ibid.,  510).  We  do  not  think  that  it 
evidences  forgetfulness,  but  inability  to  maintain  the  high 
position  with  which  the  discussion  started.  So,  in  characteriz- 
ing Shaftesbury's  system,  we  should  say  that  in  intention  it  is 
intuitional,  but  becomes  hedonistic  in  its  realization.  And 
yet,  strange  to  say,  Shaftesbury  himself  is  in  character  a  fine 
exhibition  of  a  man  whose  virtue  may  be  said  to  be  guided 
by  intuitional  promptings.  He  was  better  than  his  teaching. 
And  yet,  this  teaching  may  be  said  to  be  a  tribute  to  his  virtue. 
So  enamoured  of  the  good  was  he  that  he  conceded  to  human 
weakness  by  providing  for  the  securance  of  virtue  through 
the  added  attraction  of  a  hedonistic  motive. 

39 


DISCUSSION 
III. 

Shaftesbury's  merit  as  ethical  teacher  is  great  and  man- 
ifold. Up  to  his  time  morality  had  been  made,  as  Hunt 
(Religious  Thought,  II.,  347)  has  said,  uto  depend  upon 
the  authority  of  the  State,  the  Church,  or  the  will  of  God." 
"The  Bible  was  supposed  to  determine  what  was  right  or 
wrong"  (Ibid1.,  359).  The  progress  of  thought  and  inves- 
tigation, and  the  growth  of  a  liberal  spirit  would  make  such 
basis  of  morality  very  insecure.  Shaftesbury  anticipated  this 
by  removing  the  basis  of  morality  from  what  might  be  con- 
strued as  secondary  and  placing  it  in  the  ultimate  constitution 
of  the  universe  itself.  He  was  the  first  in  English  thought, 
in  the  novelty  and  attractiveness  of  his  presentation,  to  pro- 
test against  a  manufactured  morality,  whether  human  or 
divine.  Morality  has  never  been  made  more  august  than 
when  Shaftesbury,  in  his  forceful  way,  made  it  obligatory 
even  upon  God  Himself. 

Shaftesbury  may  be  credited  with  having  initiated  the 
impulse  which  led  to  the  popularization  of  the  doctrine  of 
viewing  morality  sub  specie  eterni.  This  conception  gives 
dignity  to  the  smallest  moral  act  by  ascribing  to  it  a  universal 
relation  and  significance.  Acts  may  be  small  but  not  unim- 
portant. This  makes  man  cooperative  with  the  universe. 
There  is  an  old  traditional  Jewish  view  that  man  is  intended 
to  be  and  should  be  in  partnership  with  the  deity  to  realize 
the  possibilities  of  the  universe.  Shaftesbury  raises  man  to 
the  higher  dignity  of  partnership  with  the  universe  itself,  with 
which,  according  to  his  teaching,  God  Himself  must  be  in 
harmonious  relation. 

Shaftesbury  has  anticipated  some  of  the  general  convic- 
tions of  present-day  sociological  teaching,  although  his  con- 
clusions were  reached  speculatively  instead  of  by  empirical 
investigation.  "There  is  hardly  a  single  fact  in  the  whole 
range  of  sociological  knowledge,"  says  Giddings  (Elements 
of  Sociology,  232),  that  does  not  support  the  conclusion  that 
the  race  was  social  before  it  was  human,  and  that  its  social 
qualities  were  the  chief  means  of  developing  its  human 
nature."  This  is  fundamental  with  Shaftesbury  in  opposi- 
tion to  Hobbes.  The  consequent  teaching  that  society  must 

40 


take  precedence,  Shaftesbury  urged  with  even  greater  in- 
sistence than  Herbert  Spencer.  "The  life  of  the  social  or- 
ganism," says  Spencer  (Data  of  Ethics,  Ch.  VIII. ,  Sec.  49), 
"must,  as  an  end,  rank  above  the  lives  of  its  units."  But, 
according  to  him,  this  organism  is  the  result  of  expediency 
and  not  of  the  universal  constitution,  as  with  Shaftesbury. 
"Living  together,"  says  Spencer  (Ibid.),  "arose  because,  on 
the  average,  it  proved  more  advantageous  to  each  than  living 
apart."  But  social  integrity  with  Spencer  is  essential  as  con- 
tributory to  continued  individual  self-preservation.  Accord- 
ingly, "the  subordination  of  personal  to  social  welfare  is 
contingent,"  says  he;  "it  depends  on  the  presence  of  antag- 
onistic societies.  When  such  cease,  the  need  for  sacrifice  of 
private  claims  to  public  claims  ceases  also"  (Ibid.)  Shaftes- 
bury's  view  is  opposite.  He  also  maintains  the  superior  right 
of  the  social  whole,  but  subordination  of  self  is  not  contingent 
and  will  not  be  removed.  The  individual  is  incidental,  the 
whole  is  essential  and  will  have  to  continue  so. 

Spencer  and  modern  sociological  teaching  in  general  agree 
that  society  is  not  a  manufacture  but  a  growth,  (cf .  Spencer : 
Social  Organism,  270.)  In  this  connection  he  objects  to  the 
social  conceptions  of  Plato  and  Hobbes  on  the  ground  of 
their  artificiality.  But  his  conception  was  forestalled  by 
Shaftesbury  and  in  a  more  thorough-going,  vital  way.  To 
Spenced  (Ibid)  there  exists  scarcely  any  mutual  dependence 
of  parts  in  the  early  undeveloped  states  of  society,  whereas 
"in  our  conception  of  a  social  organism  we  must  include  all 
that  lower  organic  existence  on  which  human  existence  de- 
pends" (Ibid.,  272).  This  very  inclusion  of  the  lower  with 
the  higher  characterizes  Shaftesbury  and  in  a  more  thorough- 
going fashion  than  with  Spencer.  While  Spencer,  as  Muir- 
head  has  pointed  out  (Ethics,  128,  note),  holds  the  doctrine 
of  the  social  organism  with  feeble  grasp,  as  though  it  were 
an  interesting  analogy  or  metaphor,  Shaftesbury  conceives 
of  it  as  vital  and  fundamental.  Muirhead  says  (Ibid.,  127) 
that  "for  the  atomic  theory  of  human  nature  modern  science 
has  substituted  the  organic."  This  substitution  can  properly 
be  first  credited  to  Shaftesbury. 

In  keeping  with  this  organic  social  conception  is  the  evo- 
lutionary ethical  one.  This  evolutionary  ethical  conception 
Shaftesbury  also  emphasized.  "Moral  obligation  at  any  par- 
ticular stage,"  says  Muirhead  (Ethics,  212),  "rests,  not 

41 


merely  on  the  call  to  maintain  a  particular  form  of  moral 
organization,  but  to  maintain  and  forward  the  cause  of  moral 
order  as  a  whole."  "Duty  rests  upon  a  personal  interest  in 
a  moral  order"  (Ibid).  To  this  Shaftesbury  would  have 
given  immediate  and  literal  assent.  But  Shaftesbury's  teach- 
ing is  of  broader  scope  than  that  of  the  insistence  of  evo- 
lutionary ethics.  For  while,  as  stated  by  Stephen  (Science  of 
Ethics,  1 60),  the  moral  law  of  evolutionary  ethics  defines  a 
property  of  the  social  tissue,  the  same  law  as  urged  by 
Shaftesbury  bears  reference  to  what  he  would  call  the  uni- 
versal tissue. 

Shaftesbury's  most  characteristic  doctrine,  that  which 
distinguishes  him  most  radically  from  other  ethical  writers 
and  makes  him  to  that  extent  unique,  is  his  inculcation  of 
what  he  calls  the  moral  sense.  This  contribution  of  his  to 
ethical  teaching  may,  however,  be  required  to  suffer  some 
detraction  and  be  regarded  as  having  been  exaggerated  in 
importance,  and  accordingly  too  largely  credited.  Stephen 
may  be  said  to  have  misunderstood  and  misrepresented  it 
entirely.  He  interprets  it  as  a  "natural  tendency  to  virtue" 
(English  Thought,  II.,  29),  and  considers  it  to  owe  its 
origination  to  the  influence  of  the  universal  harmony  just  as 
this  same  harmony  produces  in  our  imagination  sense  of  the 
beautiful,  and  in  our  reason  generates  philosophy  (Ibid.,  30) . 
The  moral  sense  of  Shaftesbury's  teaching  is  neither  a 
tendency  to  virtue  nor  is  it  produced  by  the  universal  har- 
mony. It  is  a  sensitiveness  and  responsiveness  to  the  good 
which  it  recognizes  as  soon  as  it  confronts  it,  but  is  not 
called  into  being  by  it.  It  is  a  native  endowment  natural  to 
man  as  the  harmony  it  perceives  is  natural  to  the  universe. 
But  Shaftesbury  has  not  suggested  a  novelty  ethically  so  much 
as  he  has  attempted  to  give  philosophic  expression  and  dig- 
nity to  a  familiar  fact  of  universal  recognition.  We  com- 
monly describe  our  recognition  of  the  good  in  terms  of  feel- 
ing. We  apprehend  a  certain  ethical  distinction  or  frame  a 
definite  ethical  resolution.  When  asked  for  an  explanation  we 
naively  say  that  we  feel  it  to  be  right  or  wrong,  as  the  case 
may  be.  This  feeling  is  what  generally  dominates  our 
character.  Upon  this  Shaftesbury  seized.  He  overlooked 
that  it  is  a  product  and  secondary  to  the  more  rapid  and 
elusive  operation  of  mental  recognition  and,  giving  it  a 
primary  position  in  our  inner  life,  called  it  under  the  name  of 

42 


moral  sense  that  by  which  goodness  is  recognized.  His  pro- 
cedure is  striking,  but  psychologically  incorrect.  This  opinion 
finds  support  in  the  judgment  of  Warner  Fite  that  "we 
should  refuse  to  regard  the  moral  sense  as  the  unanalyzable 
utterance  of  a  special  faculty"  (Ethics,  23). 

This  ought  not,  however,  to  be  taken  to  rob  Shaftes- 
bury's teaching  of  moral  value.  It  has  high  worth,  but  in 
another  direction.  In  his  attribution  of  moral  apprehension 
to  a  moral  sense  he  has  given  emphasis  to  a  fact  of  ethical 
import  that  is  not  always  recognized  by  ethical  theorists 
and  is  not  sufficiently  familiar  to  the  more  practical  generality 
of  mankind,  and  that  is,  that  morality  is  ultimately  deter- 
mined by  feeling  and  not  by  intellectual  conviction.  This  is 
a  truth  of  very  ancient  recognition.  When  Socrates  says  that, 
to  know  the  right  is  to  do  it,  there  is  reason  to  believe  that 
knowledge  implied  more  than  mere  intellectual  apprehension, 
and  that  is  the  consequent  and  attendant  sensitive  experience. 
Pure  intellect  is  impassive,  reason  is  cold.  Neither  alone 
would  effect  anything  in  the  realm  of  conduct.  The  bridge 
is  furnished  by  the  impetus  of  feeling.  The  Bible  may  be 
construed  as  having  given  this  forceful  expression  when  it 
says  (Proverbs,  IV.,  23),  "Keep  thy  heart  with  all  diligence 
for  out  of  it  are  the  issues  of  life."  This  fact  of  the  primacy 
of  feeling,  as  determining  factor  in  the  moral  life,  is  what 
Shaftesbury  may  be  said  to  have  implied  in  his  teaching  of 
the  moral  sense. 

While  Shaftesbury's  merit  is  great  in  having  given 
philosophical  expression  and  emphasis  to  a  familiar  ex- 
perience, he  might  have  placed  us  under  greater  obligation 
had  he  indicated,  or  even  intimated,  how  the  moral  sense 
is  to  be  educated.  That  it  is  educable  he  maintained,  as  has 
been  pointed  out.  When  Plato  presented  in  his  republic  the 
method  of  education  for  the  citizen  of  the  ideal  common- 
wealth he  gave  due  attention  to  the  development  of  the  inner 
life  by  requiring,  among  other  things,  that  careful  and  ex- 
tensive attention  be  given  to  the  matter  of  right  environ- 
ment. Shaftesbury  might  have  done  similarly,  and  in  so 
doing  have  achieved  more  for  ethical  theory  in  general,  than 
by  the  mere  inculcation  of  his  moral  sense.  It  would  have 
been,  if  tenable  and  effective,  a  valuable  contribution  to  the 
furtherance  of  a  scientific  ethics. 

The   genuineness   of   Shaftesbury's   originality  has   suf- 

43 


fered  detraction.  Windelband  maintains  that  "the  ancient 
conception  of  life,  in  accordance  with  which  morality  coin- 
cides with  the  undisturbed  unfolding  of  man's  true  and 
natural  essence,  was  directly  congenial  to  Shaftesbury  and 
became  the  living  basis  of  his  thought"  (Hist,  of  Phil.,  508 ) . 
There  is  room  to  maintain  that  Shaftesbury's  originality  is 
really  not  compromised  here.  His  theory  is  more  than  one 
of  a  mere  self-unfolding.  It  is  rather  one  of  a  self-adapta- 
tion. What  Fowler  says  is  more  to  the  point  when  he  sug- 
gests (Shaftesbury,  98)  that  Shaftesbury's  analogy  between 
art  and  morals,  beauty  and  virtue,  is  evidently  derived  from 
Plato,  while  his  conviction  of  man's  native  sociality  and  other 
elements  are  taken  from  Aristotle  and  Plato.  Some  of  the 
elements  which  Shaftesbury  must  have  taken  from  Plato 
may  be  found,  among  others,  in  the  Protagoras  (p.  110)  : 
is  not  the  wiser  the  fairer?;  in  the  Gorgias  (p.  95)  :  the  good 
soul  is  that  in  which  there  is  harmony  and  order;  in  the 
Phaedo  (p.  423)  :  where  vice  is  denominated  discord  and 
virtue  harmony.  Shaftesbury's  teaching  of  the  absoluteness 
of  beauty  and  goodness  is  also  Platonic  (Phaedo,  391 ) .  His 
larger  indebtedness  to  his  great  master  may  be  found  in  his 
probable  derivation  from  him  of  his  insistence  upon  a  uni- 
versal organism  and  of  the  consequent  truth  of  the  necessity 
of  a  knowledge  of  the  whole  for  a  comprehension  of  a  part. 
"All  nature  is  akin,"  says  Plato  (Meno,  p.  255),  "and  there 
is  no  difficulty  in  the  soul's  eliciting  all  out  of  a  single  recol- 
lection," and  "Can  anyone  who  does  not  know  virtue  know 
a  part  of  virtue?"  (Ibid.,  253).  Shaftesbury's  constant 
reference  to  a  higher  whole  as  norm  of  valuation  of  the 
particulars  of  our  experience  reproduces  in  some  instances 
with  striking  similarity  the  teaching  of  Plato  that  those  are 
blind  who  are  deprived  of  the  knowledge  of  the  true  being 
of  each  thing,  and  have  in  their  souls  no  clear  pattern,  and 
are  unable,  as  with  a  painter's  eye,  to  look  at  the  very  truth 
and  to  that  original  to  repair  (Republic,  Bk.  VI.,  p.  310). 

Shaftesbury's  reproduction  of  the  platonic  identification 
of  virtue  and  harmony  is  only  natural,  according  to  Palmer 
(Field  of  Ethics,  94),  who  says  that  in  general,  "Testimony 
of  every  sort,  gather  it  where  we  may,  shows  that  the  human 
mind  has  always  identified,  or  tended  to  identify,  the  field  of 
beauty  and  the  field  of  goodness."  To  this  may  be  added 
that  it  can  be  further  shown,  and  this  easily,  that  both  in  his 

44 


idea  of  the  necessity  of  man's  adaptation  to  the  universal 
harmony  and  in  the  evident  spirit,  as  well  as  in  a  particular 
expression  of  many  of  his  sentiments,  Shaftesbury  is  plainly 
either  a  literal  reproduction  or  a  refined  modification  of  the 
spirit  and  teachings  of  Stoicism.     Even  a  cursory  reading 
of  his  "Philosophical  Regimen"  will  inforce  this  conclusion. 
The  time  in  which  his  moral  teaching  took  shape  was  one  of 
an  intense  Grecian  spirit  (Gizycki,  89) .    His  youth  had  been 
richly  stored  with  classic  knowledge.     Latin  and  Greek  were 
to  him  like  mother  tongues.    Xenophon  and  Plato,  Epictetus 
and  Aurelius,  Horace  and  Lucian  were  the  companions  of 
his  youth  and  the  friends  of  his  life  (Herder  in  Gizycki,  i). 
He  quotes  the  Stoics  frequently  and  refers  to  them  as  "the 
learned  masters"   (Char.,  II.,  280),  along  the  line  in  which 
he  has  drawn  from  them.     Many  of  his  opinions  and  convic- 
tions are  almost  literal  reproductions  of  those  of  the  Stoics. 
In  his  exposition  of  Grecian  and  Roman  Stoicism,   Davis 
(p.  79)    says  that  "their  followers  were  taught  to  live  in 
harmony  with  nature,  conformably  with  reason,  and  the  de- 
mands of  universal  good."      "Can  anything  be  more  de- 
sirable," asks  Shaftesbury  (Char.,  II.,  148),  "than  to  follow 
nature?"     "True  rational  life  (which  with  man  is  the  only 
true  life)  is  when  the  will  is  subject  to  reason"   (Regimen, 
254).     "By  freedom  from  our  passions  and  low  interests  we 
are  reconciled  to  the  goodly  order  of  the  universe"  (Char., 
II.,  148).     This  harmony  with  the  goodly  order  of  the  uni- 
verse was,  as  has  been  shown,  the  main  message  of  Shaftes- 
bury's  teaching.     This  harmony  was  to  him  virtue,  as  it  was 
to  the  Stoics,  and  this  virtue  happiness  to  him  as  to  them. 
Shatfesbury  himself,  in  the  genuineness  and  loftiness  of  his 
character,  is  an  impressive  exemplification  of  the  stoic  spirit 
incorporated  in  action.     Accordingly,  it  should  be  said  that 
Shaftesbury's  real  originality  lies  in  his  teaching  of  the  moral 
sense,  although  this  may  be  open  to  the  interpretation,  as  has 
been  pointed  out,  of  being  a  dignified  philosophical  phrasing 
of  a  commonplace  familiar  fact  of  the  life  of  the  feelings. 
And  yet,  even  this  does  not  necessarily  imply  a  discreditable 
detraction.    A  more  serious  one  may  be  made  with  reference 
to  his  repetition  of  the  Socratic  mistake  of  identifying  knowl- 
edge with  virtue.    Such  identification  is  true  only  to  a  limited 
extent.    It  is  true  of  a  Socrates  as  of  a  Shaftesbury,  but  not  of 
mankind  generally.     In  this  particular  aspect  of  his  teaching 

45 


Shaftesbury's  ethics  lacks  the  quality  of  scientific  require- 
ment. Shaftesbury  may  be  found  to  err  further  in  his  view  of 
man's  nature  in  his  excessive  generalization  on  the  side  of 
man's  goodness,  as  Hobbes  erred  on  the  side  of  man's 
wickedness.  It  is  truer  to  say  that  all  men  are  no  particular 
thing  morally,  but  merely  possibilities  for  good  or  evil. 

Another  qualification  of  Shaftesbury's  originality  may 
be  found  in  his  ethical  requirement  of  submission  to  the 
world-order  which,  as  Gizycki  has  pointed  out  (Philosophic, 
198),  is  the  summation  of  all  religion.  He  has  virtually 
narrowed  and  carried  over  into  the  field  of  ethics  a  concep- 
tion that  properly  belongs  to  and  which  he  may  unconsciously 
have  taken  from  the  realm  of  religion.  Religion  is  an  at- 
tempt at  harmonization  with  the  world-order  as  expressive 
of  a  God.  Shaftesbury's  system  makes  the  same  demand  for 
ethics,  but  omits  God. 

Finally,  the  most  fundamental  criticism  that  can  be  passed 
upon  Shaftesbury's  system  refers  not  to  its  originality,  but  to 
the  value  of  its  ethical  principle.  If  that  is  ethical  which,  ac- 
cording to  him,  is  harmonious  with  the  whole,  by  what 
criterion  can  one  tell  when  such  harmonization  has  been 
attained.  With  regard  to  this  important  demand  Shaftes- 
bury has  left  us  without  other  aid  than  the  moral  sense, 
which  is  insufficient. 

And  yet,  Shaftesbury's  greatness  as  a  moral  teacher 
stands.  He  saw  that  ethics  must  not  stand  in  independent 
isolation  as  a  department  of  life,  but  most  express  one's  at- 
titude to  the  world  as  a  whole.  He  thus  gave  the  subject 
philosophic  formulation  and  contributed  towards  making  it 
scientific  by  relieving  it  of  arbitrary  aspects.  Robertson  in 
his  "Introduction  to  the  Characteristics"  (p.  45),  says  that 
the  "Characteristics"  can  still  hold  its  own  with  most  of  the 
books  with  which  it  competed  in  its  generation.  This  is  in- 
adequate praise.  Mackintosh  (Dissertation,  p.  117)  is 
nearer  the  truth  when  he  says  of  the  "Inquiry  concerning 
Virtue,"  that  it  is  "unquestionably  entitled  to  a  place  in  the 
first  rank  of  English  moral  philosophy."  Not  only  can 
Shaftesbury  hold  his  own  with  any  of  the  theorists  of  his 
day,  not  only  is  he  superior  to  most  of  them,  but  he  does  not 
suffer  in  the  value  of  his  ethical  writing  in  comparison  with 
writers  even  of  the  present  day.  There  is  justification  for 
venturing  the  opinion  that  time  will  only  heighten  his  im- 

46 


portance  and  broaden  and  strengthen  his  position  in  the  gen- 
eral esteem.  This  opinion  finds  support  in  Hettner,  who 
says  (Geschichte,  p.  172)  :  "Seine  Reize  sind  ewig  neu. 
Unsere  Gegenwart  thut  sehr  Unrecht,  ihn  ausser  acht  zu 
lassen."  "Wir  haben  alle  Ursache  wieder  zu  seinen  Schriften 
zuruck-zu  kehren"  (Ibid.,  187). 

Shaftesbury  was  an  exceptional  man.  His  teachings  are 
exponent  of  his  character.  This  may  be  extensively  illus- 
trated. An  impressive  exemplification  may  be  found  in  his 
exalted  unselfishness,  as  expressed  with  regard  to  the  relation 
of  author  and  reader,  when  he  says,  "Should  I  have  the  good 
fortune  to  raise  the  masterly  spirit  of  just  criticism  in  my  read- 
ers and  exalt  them  ever  so  little  above  the  lazy,  timorous, 
over-modest,  or  resigned  state  in  which  the  generality  of  them 
remain,  though  by  this  very  spirit  I  myself  might  possibly 
meet  my  doom,  I  should,  however,  abundantly  congratulate 
with  myself  on  these  my  low  flights,  be  proud  of  having 
plumed  the  arrows  of  better  wits,  and  furnished  artillery  or 
ammunition  of  any  kind  to  those  powers  to  which  I  myself 
had  fallen  a  victim.  Fungar  vice  cotis :  I  will  play  the  part 
of  a  whetstone,  Horace  De  arte  poet,  304.  (Char.,  II.,  313.) 

Character  is  coming  increasingly  to  be  the  center  of 
human  interest  and  emphasis.  This  will  only  redound  to  a 
growth  in  interest  in  Shaftesbury's  teachings.  He  was  un- 
usual in  qualification  for  such  teaching.  Libby  (Journal  of 
Psychol.,  XII.,  458)  characterizes  him  as  an  aesthetic  mind 
strongly  interested  in  moral  and  religious  questions.  He  was, 
what  is  more  to  the  point,  an  intensely  moral  man,  profoundly 
interested  in  moral  speculation.  The  ethical  man  is  certainly 
the  best  ethical  expositor.  Plato  (Phaedrus,  555)  says:  "He 
who  has  become  corrupted  is  not  easily  carried  out  of  this 
world  to  the  sight  of  beauty  in  the  other,"  the  meaning  of 
which  is  that  an  unethical  man  is  not  a  good  ethical  teacher. 
Conversely,  Shaftesbury  was  well  fitted  for  his  task.  His 
teachings  welled  from  and  are  freighted  with  intense  moral 
conviction.  He  will,  therefore,  because  of  what  he  was,  at- 
tract an  increasing  attention  to  what  he  taught,  while  his 
teachings  will  enjoy  a  widening  influence  because  of  the 
quality  of  their  author. 


47 


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